Spellbound Moonlight
by tigertailzlc
Summary: Alec Lightwood is dragged into a Downworlder-Nephilim party and accidentally stumbles into a world he never knew existed. Now he's on a quest to reverse the night's catastrophes... Post City of Glass. Post Deathly Hallows.
1. Chapter 1

"We should do this more often," said Magnus, his cat eyes glinting almost mischievously as he led Alec up the stairs of Luke's house. Alec knocked on the door of what was now Clary's room, right next to Jocelyn's. Sounds of conversation and laughter drifted through the space under the door.

"Yeah. That was fun," Alec said with a smile, just as someone inside – Clary – called, "Come in!"

Alec pushed open the door, and then paused on the threshold, blinking. "Um, hi," he said uncertainly, glancing around at the crowd assembled in Clary's bedroom. "I didn't realize there would be so many people here."

Jace, sprawled over half of Clary's bed, waved an arm lazily. "Join in the fun," he said, grinning. "Simon is entertaining us with bad mundie literature. Nobody's listening, really, except Izzy. He'll be glad of an audience."

Simon grinned, holding up a copy of _Twilight_. "This is awesome stuff," he said. "You wouldn't believe the author's incredible imagination. It would be _so_ sweet if I were, like, rock hard and ice cold and looked like a supermodel. Though it would kind of suck if I had to go around looking like a walking crystal."

Alec laughed. "Magnus would like you a lot more," he said, and then broke off. "What?"

Everyone was staring at him.

"Alec," Jace said. "Did you just laugh? At something _Simon_ said? I mean, if you were going to laugh at something, you might have –"

"What?" said Alec again, bemused. "Can't I laugh at a joke?"

"You know," Isabelle said, tilting her head and looking thoughtfully at Alec, "if coming out made you this much happier, you should totally have done it earlier. I mean, Mom and Dad didn't mind. Or not that much, anyway. Dad will get over it."

"Oh, I don't think it's so much the having come out as the being in love," Jace said, a smirk playing on his lips as he raised one eyebrow at Magnus, who was standing a little behind Alec, still in the doorway. Magnus shut the door and crossed his arms over his chest, leaning against the wall and looking pleased with himself. "Because only I can make him this happy," he said smugly, earning himself a scowl. "Besides," he added, "he only came out because he thought he was going to die that time. Pre-battle nerves."

Nobody answered. Alec's scowl faded away as he remembered who had really died during the recent battle. The image of his little brother's face was still sharp, much sharper than the half-finished drawing of Max that was sitting on Clary's desk. The room fell silent.

Isabelle awkwardly broke the silence. "It kind of sucks," she said – and she looked pointedly at Simon – "watching Jace and Clary, and watching Alec and Magnus, and me not having anyone to have fun with. And I'm the best-looking one here, too."

"Nope," Jace said instantly. "That would be me."

"That would be Alec," Magnus put in, still smirking. He looked across at Jace, and then back at Alec. "He still thinks you're awfully pretty, though."

Alec scowled at the floor. "I do not," he protested.

"Now that's more like the Alec I know," Jace said approvingly. "Surly and grumpy, and a really, really bad liar."

Magnus snorted.

Jace looked at him evenly. "You're not jealous, are you? Because I hate to break it to you, but – as always – Alec's got his head screwed on straight. I really am the best looking person in this room."

This time, Magnus laughed. "Straight? Hardly."

There was a collective groan and a lot of eye-rolling. Magnus glanced at Alec. "Well, now that you're safe with your friends," he said, "I have to go. Chairman Meow seems to be missing in action. And some idiot vampire is complaining that he had holy water poured down his cycle _again_."

"Ah." Jace and Simon glanced at each other, biting their lips and obviously struggling not to laugh. "Is he _very_ ticked off?" Simon asked innocently. Magnus glared at him and did not deign to answer. "Bye," he said to Alec, opening the door again.

"Have fun," Alec murmured, laughing.

"Wait," said Jace, sitting up and accidentally elbowing Clary in the ribs. "Magnus – are you going to be at the police station tonight?"

Magnus narrowed his eyes. "The _police station_?"

"The werewolf haunt. It's a Downworlder-Nephilim party," Clary put in, rubbing her side and glancing reproachfully at Jace. "All the vampires are going to be there," Simon added. "Luke and Maia, too, of course, with all the werewolves."

Isabelle scowled. "How come nobody told me about this?" she demanded indignantly, of Simon in particular.

"Sorry," Simon said hastily, squirming. "You can come, too, of course."

"I will," said Isabelle. "_Definitely_."

Magnus raised an eyebrow, but said only – "Alec? Are you going?"

"He is," Jace said confidently, making Alec splutter. Jace scowled at Magnus. "What have you done to him? You have to share him, you know."

Magnus grinned. "And you asked me if _I_ was jealous," he said cheerfully. Jace rolled his eyes. "Are you coming or are you not?"

Magnus gave him a long, level look. Then he nodded. "I'm coming."


	2. Chapter 2

"I still don't think you should be wearing those runes," Jace said, frowning as he led the way hurriedly along the street toward the police station. "The last time you did, things didn't exactly turn out very well, did they?"

"The last time Clary Marked me, I actually had something to fear," Alec said, keeping up with the group easily. He silently wished, not for the first time, that he could create runes as powerful as Clary's. His left hand still stung where Clary's stele had burned across it, but the Speed rune she had drawn there made his stride effortless. They walked fast, all of them, more out of habit than anything else – the glamours they wore made them invisible, and they weren't hiding from anything except mundanes. "Since when are you the cautious one, anyway? That's my role," Alec added jokingly.

"Well, seeing as you're now fearless as well as fast," Jace said, "_somebody_ has to do all the worrying."

That was the other thing – apart from the Speed rune, she'd also Marked him with the Fearless rune.

Clary snorted. "You, Jace," she said, "are the last person anyone would expect to worry about anything."

"And it's just a Fearless rune," Isabelle put in. "I mean, apart from the fact that Alec is already almost incapable of doing anything dumb, it's not like Clary Marked him with Reckless, or Stupid, or anything."

"She didn't have to," Jace retorted sharply.

Alec winced. In part, Jace was right – the last time he'd been Marked with Clary's Fearless rune, he had come close to doing some extremely stupid things. He smiled sheepishly. "Don't worry," he said. "I won't do anything idiotic this time, promise."

"What does it feel like?" Simon wondered out loud, catching up to Alec. "Being Marked with that Fearless rune, I mean. I've only ever had this Mark of Cain, and it isn't even a proper rune. Not really."

Alec was quiet for a moment. "Strange," he said finally. "I mean, I don't feel much different than normal at the moment, but it kind of gives you a sense of detachment. And... confidence." He shrugged. "Figures, I guess."

Simon laughed. "So – kind of like being on coke," he said, turning a corner. The police station loomed into view, dimly lit and full of movement. "You have an addiction to fearlessness, which is almost exactly what snorting coke does to you."

"Addiction?" Alec looked bemused. "To, uh, coke?"

"Not Cola," Jace said, rolling his eyes. "Cocaine."

"None here, kids, sorry," said a familiar voice, and Alec spun around with everyone else to see someone trudging toward them, a rucksack swinging at his side. "Why, what are you up to now?"

"Luke! Hi," Clary said, blinking. "We're not up to anything. Is everyone already here?"

"Pretty much. Go on in and have fun," said Luke, waving an arm. "Don't go too crazy, will you? This must be the fifth party we've had, and it hasn't even been a month since the New Council was formed."

"Sure, sure," Isabelle said absentmindedly, already scanning the crowd. "Where's Maia?" she asked curiously.

"No idea," Luke said, shrugging. "Went off on her own somewhere." And he walked off.

Isabelle immediately tugged on Simon's arm. "Come on," she ordered, and Simon glanced apologetically back at them all before following her into the throng. Clary laughed. "Poor Simon," she commented, but she was grinning. Alec couldn't help seeing the funny side, too, remembering what he'd said so long ago about exactly how important he thought Simon was to his sister.

But that had been ages ago. At the moment, Jace and Clary looked like they wanted to be left alone – where Isabelle loved inappropriate boys, those two were still reveling in their newfound lack-of-forbidden – and Alec wanted to find Magnus. Fearless or not, he didn't much like parties. Besides, Jace and Clary weren't the only couple around enjoying newfound freedom.

Doing a quick three-sixty of his surroundings and not seeing the tall warlock anywhere, he reluctantly walked into the police station, which was dank and smelt of alcohol and sweat. There were no lights anywhere, but the full moon bathed everything in an eerie silver glow. He cursed as he put his foot into a viscous puddle of liquid, getting elbowed several times as he crossed the room. He saw Raphael and his clan in one dark corner, keeping to themselves and apparently having a good time; remembering what Magnus had said about the vampire motorcycle, he walked over to them, for once not pausing to think twice.

One of the vampires saw him coming and gave him a brilliant smile. She was tall and slender, wearing an air of ancientness and a wispy black dress that made her look more like a witch than a vampire. Alec was astonished to see that there was a large gray goose at her side, and that it was also eyeing him with curiosity.

She stood, picking the goose up in her arms, and tilted her head. "Shadowhunter," she said, by way of greeting. "What are you doing here?"

"Nothing," Alec said, trying to work out if she was hostile or not. "I'm, uh, just looking for someone."

"Serafina?" one of the vampires called, frowning. The vampire – Serafina – gestured at them to wait, and turned back to Alec. "Who are you looking for?"

"Magnus Bane," Alec answered. "Warlock. Tall, and, well, kind of glittery. Have you–"

"Ah! The glittery warlock," Serafina said, nodding. "Yes – nobody could miss him, if you know what I mean. You want to go over there, by the corridor leading off to the old offices. That's where the warlocks are." She smiled ruefully. "New Council or not, I think we will keep to our old divides for a while yet."

"Thanks," Alec said, not quite sure how to respond to this last remark. But Serafina was already gone, along with her goose. Alec turned away and headed toward the corridor she had indicated.

As he passed by one of the abandoned offices, he heard a low moan coming from inside. He shuddered, walking quickly past, not wanting to know what was going on there. Several other warlocks eyed him as he walked by, but they left him alone. He couldn't see Magnus anywhere. But then, Magnus was never where he should be.

He heard the moan again as he doubled back, louder this time and followed by a high-pitched whine. He stopped, frowning. Whoever was making the noise, it sounded like they were in pain. The whining came again, and Alec began to wonder if he should find Luke; the noises sounded like they belonged to a canine creature.

Acting on instinct, he slowly pushed open the door and peered through the crack, his mind and body alert, wary, but collected.

His eyes flew wide open, and he stopped breathing.

"_What_ the _hell_–!" he choked, and then clamped his jaw shut as the creature – whatever it was – turned to look at him.

It studied Alec through narrowed yellow eyes, and then let rip a snarl, baring long, saliva-coated teeth. It looked human, only grotesquely misshapen, crouched over in a sort of fetal position. And it was covered in hair – ragged patches of it, dark brown and tawny.

The first thing that entered Alec's mind was _demon_, but he had never seen a demon like this before; the second thing he thought of was _werewolf_, except none of Luke's pack looked anything like this when they Changed. Before he had time to register anything else, it – whatever _it_ was – leaped up and crashed out of the window. There was a deafening noise and shards of glass scattered everywhere, leaving a clean, wrecked window frame.

Later, Alec would always wonder why he did what he did then – maybe it was Clary's powerful runes, maybe it was sheer stupidity, maybe something else. But at that moment he didn't stop to think; pushing away a fleeting thought of Magnus, he leapt after the creature and gave chase.

He almost tripped at first, but quickly regained his balance, glancing incredulously at the ground blurring under his feet. He hadn't had the chance to fully accelerate before, but now he found out exactly how much speed it lent him. He was grateful that he was on the outskirts of the city, and running on one of New York's very rare patches of semi-wilderness, away from manmade obstacles and Mundane eyes. Disorientation quickly gave way to enjoyment as he tailed his quarry.

Then enjoyment quickly turned to a whole lot of pain when the creature – who, up close and moonlit, was almost certainly some sort of freak werewolf – whirled around without warning. Alec was going too fast to stop himself before he was in close range; suddenly there was hot breath on his neck and teeth sinking into his left shoulder. He yelled, fumbling frantically for his seraph blade; but before he could name it, the teeth were gone. The werewolf gave him another look, half bewildered and half vicious, before letting rip another howl, and turning tail.

Alec wasn't sure how long the chase lasted, after that. Everything had taken on a surreal feel; each moment blended into the next, the pain from the bite had turned into a dull ache, and his thoughts shut down, leaving him to his senses. Eventually he felt Clary's rune beginning to fade, and the moonlight fading along with it, giving way to the first lights of dawn; and the werewolf fell to the ground, whimpering pathetically. By the time Alec caught up to it, it had become a him – a boy of about his own age, breathing hard, his bright gray eyes wide and very bewildered. The ferocity had left along with the fur and teeth, leaving a wreck of what Alec realized must be a new werewolf. Getting cautiously onto his knees, he peered into the boy's terrified face.

Before Alec knew what was happening, the boy very suddenly picked himself off the floor and started to run again. Alec cursed and scrambled to his feet, wishing he still had the help of Clary's runes; still, a boy was both slower and less intimidating than a freak werewolf, and Alec kept up with relative ease. But the adrenaline high from the chase left him worn out, which was why the jolt of shock from running through a wall only hit Alec a second after he'd already run through it.

He did a double take and skidded to a halt, turning to gape at the seemingly solid wall behind him. He didn't even remember what had been on the other side. Then his head snapped around as he tried to regain sight of the werewolf boy. It was harder here – Alec found himself in the strangest city he'd ever been in, where people walked around wearing cloaks and robes, and even waving what looked like wands. Half-convinced he was dreaming, he spotted the boy again and followed at a distance, slower now as he dodged people and tried not to stare. Nobody gave him a second glance, to his relief, and the boy walked more slowly now, apparently convinced he had lost his pursuer.

What with finding the freak werewolf, chasing it, getting bitten, walking through a wall, and being in a city full of what might just be _wizards and witches_, Alec thought this must be the weirdest night of his life, dream or not. He wondered if he was crazy.

With a few furtive glances, werewolf boy let himself into a small cottage, which was lit by a single gnarled candlestick. Alec waited outside the door with bated breath and wide eyes, choking back a gasp when the boy pulled out a wand of his own. He pointed it at a dust-covered, ancient-looking fireplace.

"_Incendio,_" he murmured, and a fire sprang to life.

The boy reached into a small cauldron of powder on the mantelpiece and threw it into the flames, which turned a bright acid green. Alec's eyes widened as he stepped calmly into the fire.

Werewolf boy opened his mouth.

Realization dawned on Alec's face.

"Diagon Alley," said the boy.

Alec leapt into the fireplace and clamped his fingers around the boy's hand.

He had one last look at the cottage's interior, now tinted with a green glow; the boy's face, wearing an incredulous expression; and then everything went dark.


	3. Chapter 3

"For the last time, Alice, _I don't care,_" said Magnus dryly. "It was my party, yes, but nobody told you to bring your damn bike. Surely your brothers have told you that my parties are notorious for resulting in damaged property?"

They were in a dark corner of the police station, and the inky-haired, pixie-faced vampire he was talking to didn't look happy. She opened her mouth to speak, but Magnus cut her off. "You're irritating me," he said. "You had enough time to do that just now. You didn't have to follow me here. You're not what I'm here for."

"What are you here for, then? More destruction?" Alice scowled and followed Magnus as he began to walk away. The warlock whipped around and splayed his fingers, and she froze, her arms snapping to her sides. "Go _away_," said Magnus exasperatedly.

Then there was a loud crash from somewhere behind them. Magnus gave a wide, winsome smile. "You see?" he said, shrugging. "Destruction's everywhere, darling."

And he walked off.

The crash had raised a considerable furor among the party-goers. Murmurs were increasing in volume, and a cluster was forming at what was presumably the scene of destruction. Magnus spotted Isabelle's head nearby, poking out from the crowd, and he approached her, looking around for her equally tall brother, and not finding him anywhere.

"What's going on?" he asked, tapping Isabelle on the shoulder. She spun around, surprised.

"No idea. Isn't Alec with you? He said he was going to look for you."

"Well, I'm looking for him, too," Magnus said, frowning. "I don't know where he's got to. With each of us looking for the other you'd think we'd have met by now. That boy was always an idiot."

Isabelle grinned. "He's speedy today," she noted casually. "All Marked up with Clary's runes. Fearless, too. He's been so _different_ lately."

"Wait," said Magnus. "He what?"

"Used Clary's runes. Remember? Fearless? You saw him the first time – he almost told our parents he was seeing you." She paused, and then grinned. "Maybe this time he was going to tell you he wants to date Simon after all, and the Speed rune was for running away after–"

"Wrong." Right on cue, Simon appeared, having woven his way through the throng. He was sporting a full glass of something golden, and a candid expression. "Maia says that Luke says that Serafina says that Alec is off chasing freak werewolves. Everyone's flipping out."

"Alec?" said Isabelle, astonished.

"Chasing freak werewolves?" said Magnus, indignant.

Simon shrugged. "Search me. Anyone know if this is safe to drink?" He held up the golden stuff for inspection. "I don't want a replay of the rat episode, but I'm thirsty."

"What is Alec doing chasing freak werewolves?" said Magnus, ignoring Simon's question. "When did this happen?"

"Since his hormones began raging, probably," said Isabelle. "I wouldn't worry too much about him if I were you. It was going to happen sooner or later. He's eighteen. And he can handle himself alright. He's not the sort to go looking for trouble."

"Um." Simon looked vaguely bemused. "Just so you know, I didn't mean that kind of chasing. I meant more like the kind of chasing which involves broken windows that make loud noises that subsequently create a lot of drama."

"The broken window was him?" Isabelle cut in, eyes widening.

"I think. That's what I gathered, anyway."

Magnus's frown deepened. "And what exactly do you mean by freak werewolves?"

Simon shrugged, contrite. "Dunno. Didn't see. Didn't want to hang around and find out. Luke and Maia are the only werewolves who talk to me anyway, and they were busy finding stuff out for themselves. But – sorry – I think it was werewolf, not werewolves. Can somebody please tell me if this is okay to drink?"

"No. Screw your drink." Magnus spun around and strode swiftly away with a distinctly irritated expression on his face. Simon watched him go, looking slightly surprised.

"Did I say something?" he asked innocently of Isabelle, who rolled her eyes. She took his glass and sipped at the liquid. "Caution's not a good thing to bring to these parties," she informed him matter-of-factly. "It tastes alright. Try it."

Still dubious, Simon drank a mouthful before looking back up at Isabelle. "So you're really not worried about Alec? At all?" he asked curiously.

Isabelle didn't answer right away. She shrugged, gazing thoughtfully at Simon. "It's not like him, I guess," she said slowly. "But I run off after boys all the time, in case you hadn't noticed. He's older than me and not crazy like Jace. So unless he doesn't make contact by, say, midnight, I guess there's no huge reason to get all worked up about it. It might not even be Alec that's run off. Knowing him, he could be off brooding in some corner or something."

Simon took another sip. "I guess you're right."


	4. Chapter 4

A few hours later, the police station was in a state of complete chaos.

Clary spotted Simon and hurried over to him. He was with Isabelle, who was pacing back and forth across the small space and muttering to herself. She stopped for a moment when she saw Clary. "Hey," she said, sounding tired. "Any news?"

Clary shook her head. "Couldn't find Magnus anywhere, either," she said.

Isabelle sighed sharply and resumed pacing. Simon watched, looking resigned. "Izzy, chill," he said, with a slight nervous edge to his tone that indicated he knew he might be assaulted for daring to make such a suggestion. But Isabelle didn't seem to hear him. He glanced at his watch. "It's only just midnight. You said yourself that Alec knows what he's doing."

"That was before I found out that by freak werewolf you actually meant _freak werewolf_, and not _random outsider_ werewolf," Isabelle retorted, shooting Simon an acid look. "Also before the entire party erupted into mayhem over the thing. We have no idea what Alec has got up to and it doesn't exactly look like he voluntarily ran off, either –"

"Well, I'm sorry!" Simon said defensively, throwing up his arms. "I didn't know all that, I told you, everyone was talking over everyone else back then and the only people who'd tell me anything were Luke and Maia –"

"_And_ it doesn't help that the Downworlders whose new bonds we were supposed to be celebrating at this party are now arguing with each other, either," Isabelle finished shrewdly.

"I don't get it," Clary put in. "Why are the vampires and the werewolves arguing?"

"They're freaking out because they need a reason to," said Simon sourly.

"They're freaking out," said Isabelle, "because they don't know what just hit them, and the vampires are suspicious of a trick, the werewolves have never seen a Child of the Moon so different from themselves before, the Shadowhunters want to know why one of ours has disappeared, and nobody managed to get more than a glimpse and a sniff of the damn werewolf in question anyway."

There was a pause.

"Right," Simon said. "Point taken."


	5. Chapter 5

It was a very horrible experience. Alec was too busy being bewildered to really notice everything that was happening, but he did note that by the time he was ejected from a small fireplace onto a dirty hearthrug, he was very dusty and very sore. He lay dazed for a few seconds before the other boy tumbled with considerable force out of the fireplace after him, and landed inches away in a heap no less dignified.

But the other boy recovered faster. He rose quickly to his feet, face and tawny hair covered in a light layer of dust, and pulled something out of his pocket. Alec noted that he was wearing strange black robes like the ones he'd seen on the people at the other end of the fireplace. The thing he was holding up now was long, and thin, and six inches away from Alec's nose.

Alec reached quickly for his seraph blade, but before he could name it, he was interrupted by a cry of "_Expelliarmus!_"

His blade flew out of his hand and into the other boy's. He gaped for a moment in astonishment. He had been trained to slaughter a variety of dangerous demons, but he had never encountered wizards before. Very vaguely, he remembered Jace telling Clary, a long time ago, "Magic is a dark and elemental force, not just a lot of sparkly wands and crystal balls and talking goldfish."

Having no idea what to do, he scrambled to his feet and said, "Give me my blade back." Even as he spoke he realized how stupid this sounded, but he didn't have a choice. He wondered suddenly if Magnus owned a wand.

The boy was studying him more closely now; he was wary, but now there was a flicker of curiosity in his gray eyes, too. He hesitated, and then lowered his wand just a fraction. Evidently, Alec's last remark had made him significantly less intimidating. He cursed inwardly.

"Don't you have a wand?" said the boy, at length.

"I'll tell you that," Alec said cautiously, "if you tell me where we are."

At this, the boy's eyes narrowed. "Yeah? I'll tell you _that_ if you tell me why you were following me."

There was silence. Alec began to speak, but then he realized he didn't know what to say. He glanced at his own arm, where the runes had long since faded away, and sighed. "Look, I'll leave you alone, okay? I – I don't know why I followed you." He ignored the skeptical arch of the other boy's eyebrows as he said this. "But I need to get back to New York."

The boy shrugged. "So go back through the fireplace."

Alec shot a glance at the fireplace. "I have no idea where it leads to. I wouldn't know how to get out of there. I don't even know how we got in. I can't walk through walls. _Did_ we walk through a wall? Where the hell is this place, anyway?"

The boy looked at him carefully. "You wouldn't know it, if I told you. You're obviously not a wizard. But I don't think you're a Muggle, either. What are you? And how old? You don't look more than seventeen."

Alec refused to be distracted by the change of subject. "_Where are we?_"

"Diagon Alley. Abandoned house." Alec's face remained blank, and the other boy rolled his eyes. "Told you so."

"I've never heard of a Diagon Alley anywhere near New York before."

This time, the other boy squinted at him, as though he was making sure Alec wasn't joking. Very slowly, and with a deliberately thick English accent, he said, "We're in _Britain_, you dimwit."

Alec's jaw dropped. "Britain!"

"Yes, Britain."

"I – I have to get back. To New York."

The boy looked at him, hard. "Well, that's your problem. Isn't it?"

"You're the one who got me here."

There was a pause. "Excuse me?" said the boy. "_I'm_ the one who got you here? You're kidding me, right? Now, I realize that not everyone can be as clever as I am, and that you seem to be particularly stupid, but I don't see how _I_ could possibly be to blame here. The only thing I might have to be apologetic about is the fact that I bit you. And I guess I'm sorry about that part. But I bit you because _you_ were _chasing me_, and you were bloody well the one who decided to chase me in the first – are you listening to me? Hello?"

But Alec wasn't listening. He seemed suddenly to be in a sort of daze.

"By the Angel," he said, very slowly.

"By the what?"

"You," Alec breathed. "You – you _bit_ me."

The other boy brought his palm to his forehead. "I wasn't kidding when I said you were particularly stupid."

Alec seemed to snap awake. With his hands shaking, he began to fumble for his stele. His fingers curled into a fist around the handle in an effort to steady his hand, and he began to draw an _iratze_, etching the familiar rune onto his skin with more force than was necessary.

The rune worked, and Alec watched with his breath held as the wound healed. The other boy looked on with interest. "Was that a healing spell?"

It was a few seconds before Alec blinked, and nodded. "A healing rune. I suppose it's much the same thing." He put the stele back into his belt slowly.

"The wounds heal," said the boy, and he rolled up his own left sleeve to reveal a stark white scar running down his arm. Alec suppressed a shudder. "They heal better with assistance, of course – magical or... otherwise." His eyes traveled over Alec's faded Marks. "But you'll have to wait until the next full moon to know if you've been turned or not."

Alec looked surprised. "Can't you Change whenever you want to?"

"No," said the boy, puzzled. "What makes you think so?"

"In the Down–" He stopped abruptly. "Where I come from – the Children of the Moon can Change at will."

"Really." The boy gave him a level stare. "Well, to be honest, I don't see why they would want to Change any more than necessary."

"So... there's no way to find out if I'm a – a werewolf now?"

The boy shook his head. "Nope. Not that I know of. You'll have to wait."

Alec stood, still and silent. He thought of Luke – Luke, who was a Shadowhunter once, a child of the Angel – Nephilim. It hadn't protected him from lycanthropy.

The boy said, quietly, "I'm sorry." He gave a resigned shrug.

Alec wondered if he should feel angry. At this boy, who had bitten him; at Clary, for Marking him; at Jace, for being right; at himself, for being stupid. But all he felt was numbness.

He turned to look at the boy. "Surely there must be a way to reverse this," he said emotionlessly.

The boy paused. "I'm looking for a way," he said, in a measured tone.

"Let me come with you. I could help you."

"Moments ago you were saying you had to get back to New York."

"That was before I remembered – registered – the bite."

There was a pause.

"Please," said Alec.

The other boy hesitated.

"You really think you can help me?" he said finally. Alec looked at him, but he couldn't find any trace of scorn in the boy's tone or expression; he spoke in a monotone, and suddenly Alec realized that he sounded tired – tired, and just this side of desperate.

Alec faltered. "No," he admitted, resigned. "But I can try. And I will – I don't need to make you believe that, do I? I need a – a cure, just as much as you do."

"You come from a whole different world."

"I can help you. I'll try. I swear by the Angel, I'll try."

The other boy glanced up at him. "Is that like an Unbreakable Vow?"

"What, swearing by the Angel?" Alec shrugged. "Well, I can't break it. So, yes, I guess."

There was another pause, longer this time. The other boy let out a sigh. "Where did you say you came from, again?"

"The..." Alec hesitated. "The Shadow World."

"And if I let you tag along, will you tell me more about this Shadow World?" The boy took a step closer to Alec and handed him back his seraph blade, which Alec took gratefully, with a muttered "Thanks."

"Well?"

Alec took a deep breath. "I can't," he said. "Well, I _can_, but you won't be able to withstand any runes – unless you have Angel blood. The same way I probably couldn't use your wand, unless I had magical blood. Wizard blood."

The boy shook his head. "No, you could. Almost everyone except Squibs can learn magic, even Muggles – people with no magical blood in them."

"Muggles?" Alec said. "Like Mundanes?"

The boy laughed. "Is _that_ what you call people without Angel blood? And I thought 'Mudblood' was unflattering. I'd hate to be coined with trivial connotations."

"I'd take Muggle over Mundane any day," Alec agreed. "Which reminds me. If you let me help... could we try to keep the fact that I'm not – not one of your kind as secret as possible?"

Again, the boy laughed. "Of course. In fact, we'd have to. We wouldn't tell anybody about the werewolf bit, either – nobody knows, yet. About me, I mean. Let's hope it'll go away soon enough that nobody will have to know."

"Has anyone actually cured lycanthropy before?"

The boy shook his head. "Nope. If they did, they kept it well secret. Believe me – tonight was my first night as a werewolf, but I spent hours, days on end in libraries, searching, trying to find anything – anything that might help. I've found nothing."

Alec raised his eyebrows. "So... what makes you think you'll be able to do it? Find a cure for lycanthropy, I mean."

The boy grinned. In the half-light of dawn, it looked more like a grimace, the shadows under his eyes dark and drawn. Alec imagined he could see sharp, elongated teeth, bared in lust and hunger... "I'm brilliant," he said with a careless shrug, and Alec snapped out of his trance. "What can I say?"

"Good to know I have a brilliant companion," Alec said, managing a faint smile.

"Hang on," said the boy. "Who said we were companions?"

Alec bit his lip, and didn't answer.

After a long while, the boy finally said, grudgingly, "Fine. We're mates."

Alec let out a breath. "Thank you," he said, very sincerely.

"Mind you," the boy added, "I am Alpha wolf, and you – you are decidedly inferior. Do you understand?"

Alec rolled his eyes. "You're just like Jace," he said with a pang of sadness. "You even look like him... except without the golden eyes."

"Who?" said the boy curiously.

"Jace... never mind."

"I can have the golden eyes, too, you know," the boy informed him, and he opened his eyes very wide. The pupils in his gray irises were dilated, his stare intense – and then suddenly his eyes were no longer gray, but a bright golden-brown, almost exactly the same shade as Jace's. Alec started in astonishment.

"I wish we Shadowhunters could do that," he said resentfully.

"Not all wizards can. It's a specialty." And then suddenly the boy's hair was jet-black, and his eyes were a luminous green.

Alec looked away. "Now you look like Magnus," he muttered, wondering if this boy could somehow read minds, as well.

The boy looked bemused. "Actually, I was thinking Harry Potter – but never mind. Incidentally, what was your name, again? I'd forgotten. I never was much good with names."

Alec shook his head. "I never told you." He paused, taking a deep breath, and let it out again – hesitating, as though saying his name out loud was going to confirm that this was real, that he wasn't dreaming.

"Alec," he said finally. "Alec Lightwood. And you?"

The boy's now green eyes lit in a smile. "Me? I'm Ted Lupin."


	6. Chapter 6

Magnus Bane was the High Warlock of Brooklyn – meaning he was well accustomed to traveling. He usually preferred doing it in the most conventional way possible, but he was used to even the most extreme means. When he was ejected from his Portal and found the decoratively paved streets of Diagon Alley flying up to meet him, centuries of experience kicked in and he righted himself as best he could, managing to land in a roll. The only damage done was a considerable jarring sensation in his left shoulder – and the rapid formation of a solid crowd of gaping spectators.

"Crap," he muttered, getting up.

It was broad daylight, and he was standing in the middle of a busy street. He glanced around as the crowd slowly surrounded him, aiming long sticks at him with one hand and gripping the hands of their children with the other. Not long sticks – wands. Magnus blinked. They were all dressed to give Magnus a run for his money, too – not quite as colorfully, but twice as outlandishly. If Magnus dressed like a gay pride parade, they dressed like a Halloween party. There was even a purple pet cat.

Turning around, he saw that he had landed exactly where he had intended; behind him was a window, and through the window he saw the same hearthrug and the same fireplace and the same bare, shabby furniture and ramshackle walls that he had seen with the tracking spell. The only thing different was the absence of Alec – Alec, and the boy he had been with. They must have moved already.

Cursing, he turned back around to face the growing crowd. There was somebody shouldering his way through the throng; when he finally reached the front, about ten feet from where Magnus stood, he pointed his own wand at his throat and muttered something. Then he began shouting, and his voice seemed to come from hidden loudspeakers in the air: "All right, everyone, clear off! Go away! Shoo! Let the Aurors deal with this..." He waved his arms about in the air, and the crowd slowly dispersed, with an air of reluctance. Meanwhile, two more men and a woman had their wands out and were still surrounding Magnus.

"Who are you?"

The one who had spoken had jet-black hair and green eyes just like Magnus's. He didn't sound hostile, but spoke with a calm confidence that suggested he was well used to dealing with people who dropped out of the sky, or did similarly alarming things.

Magnus smiled wryly. "I suppose telling you I'm just another person on the street is really not worth a shot, is it?" he said, raising an eyebrow.

The man blinked in surprise – probably at Magnus's inopportune flippancy – and then laughed. His gaze traveled pointedly over Magnus's outrageous clothes, wand never wavering. "No, I'm afraid it isn't. For one thing" – he looked Magnus in the eye – "you don't know who I am, do you?"

Under most other circumstances, Magnus would have said something rude. Instead he said, "I don't, actually. I doubt you know me, either."

"I've no idea, sorry. What are you, anyway? You look like a cross between a Muggle playing dress-up, and a really badly disguised wizard." He glanced at his companions. "Remind me to tell the Department of Muggle Studies to step up their foreign dress regulations."

Magnus inhaled slowly. "So," he said, in a carefully measured tone. "You're wizards."

At this, all four of them looked surprised. It was a while before the black-haired man answered. "Evidently," he said, with just a tinge of sarcasm.

"Well," said Magnus, and his lips suddenly curled into a smirk. "I'm a warlock."

The man blinked. "_Really._"

"Certainly. Magnus Bane. High Warlock of Brooklyn." Magnus stuck out his hand, a half-smile playing on his lips. He waited patiently for the man to take it.

The man shook his hand, very briefly, all the while holding his wand hand very still. "Harry Potter," he said guardedly.

Magnus didn't recognize the name, and wondered if he should. He could tell from their accents that they were in Britain. "I presume you witnessed my arrival?"

"I did," came the slightly amused reply. "It was a little hard to miss, actually. It looked to me like you dropped out of the... anyway, I'm not letting you alone until you tell us who exactly you are, and what you're doing here."

"I just told you, I'm Magnus Bane, and I'm the High Warlock of Brooklyn."

"What he meant," said the woman, scowling, "was tell us what exactly you mean by 'warlock', as well as why you've come here, and how you managed to come here in the first place – seeing as you clearly are not one of us."

"I'm sure I'll tell you all that – but could you put the wands down first?" Magnus asked politely, and his fingers sparked small flickers of electric-blue fire. He caught the startled expressions on the wizards' and witch's faces, the almost imperceptible tensing of their shoulders.

There was a short silence. Then – "I don't know what you can do... warlock" – it was the black-haired man; Harry Potter – "but I have a team of Aurors at my service right now, and quite a lot of backup, and I daresay we can overpower you on our home turf." He glanced pointedly at the blue sparks.

Magnus looked hard at Harry. At a closer glance, he saw a very faint scar on his forehead, the shape of a lightning-bolt; he had seemed old, the oldest of the group, but now Magnus saw that he really wasn't that aged. It was something in his character, an air of maturity that spoke of wisdom beyond his years. Magnus wondered if his kind were immortal, too... And there was something else, something that took Magnus a few seconds to place – it was the way the others looked at him, with a kind of subtle reverence. _You don't know who I am, do you?_

Magnus sighed. "You're right. I'm sorry. I wasn't being threatening, really, I was being defensive. I'm not stupid. I'm not going to attack you; in fact..."

He hesitated. Harry raised his eyebrows, waiting. Slowly, Magnus reached into his pocket; his fingers curled around something smooth and round. He realized this gesture looked suspicious and reluctantly pulled his hand out, letting them see the harmless-looking object; a small stone, swirled with translucent green and blue, with a rune carved faintly into it. The Alliance rune. He closed his eyes briefly and remembered Alec; Alec in Alicante, his gaze clear and happy; and Alec with the other boy, inside the room he now stood in front of. The room that was now empty.

He opened his eyes and looked back up at Harry. "I'm completely lost," he admitted finally. "I seem to have stumbled upon a whole new world; and under any other circumstances I'd either get the hell out or start exploring. But – but the thing is... I kind of need your help."

Harry frowned, and Magnus looked him right in the eye; knowing that the anxiety he was fighting to suppress showed quite plainly in his slitted cat eyes, that the plea in his voice was quite audible. He took a deep breath.

"You see... I'm looking for someone."


	7. Chapter 7

"I have a plan," said Ted.

He and Alec were wandering the less traveled streets of Diagon Alley, going nowhere in particular. They had been walking for some time now, having left the house with the fireplace after Alec mentioned that someone might have tried to follow him. He didn't feel like facing any of his friends at the moment, and was even more determined to avoid potential encounters with curious or angry Downworlders.

Alec glanced up at Ted. "Good to know," he said. A few minutes passed in silence, and he raised his eyebrows. "Are you planning on telling me what it is?"

"Shut up," Ted said, but he said it quite mildly. "I'm trying to think."

So Alec shoved his hands in his pockets and shut up, trailing after Ted and quietly taking in his surroundings. He thought this must be how Clary had felt when she first stumbled upon him and Jace and Isabelle, that night in Pandemonium so long ago. He wondered how long it had taken her to be sure she wasn't hallucinating.

Ted had begun muttering to himself. Alec strained to hear what he was saying. "We'll go to Hogwarts... break in..."

"Break in?" Alec interrupted, apprehensively. "To Hogwarts? Where's that?"

Ted ignored him. "But to do that, we'll have to get to Hogsmeade first... what a pain, we'll have to hide..."

"Where's Hogsmeade? Do we have to break into there, too? Ted?" Alec sighed. "Ted, can you please not ignore me?"

Suddenly Ted stopped walking and turned around, with an irritated expression on his face. He dragged Alec into a nearby corner and faced him. His eyes, now back to gray, shone with an intensity that took Alec aback; and suddenly Alec realized that Ted was just as afraid and ashamed as he was; he just hid it better.

"Listen," he said, and Alec listened. "Let's make a deal, okay? I've agreed to let you tag along with me because you're basically a lost puppy – sorry, lost _wolf_ – who just might be of some help to me on an unlikely off-chance. Now, I'm not going to explain everything to you as we do stuff, because it would take ages. So if you're going to come with me, just stick with me and stick with my plan, and don't ask questions. Okay?"

Alec stood, realizing that Ted was right. He didn't like not knowing anything, but he had no choice but to trust Ted. He dropped his gaze. "Alright," he mumbled. "Sorry."

"_Thank_ you." Ted bit his lip and paused, as though he was going to say something else, but seemed to think better of it. He set off again, at a slightly faster pace.

They emerged onto a busier avenue, where families of wizards and witches were milling around the shops. Alec noticed Ted's hair slowly change from strawberry-blond to a dark brown and guessed that he was trying to make himself less recognizable. "I'll mistake you for someone else eventually if you keep changing like that," he told Ted, though not reproachfully.

But Ted just laughed. "Are you hungry?"

"No." Alec shook his head, though he knew he ought to be starving by now. He glanced around curiously, wondering if wizards ate like Mundanes. _Muggles_, he corrected himself. _Not Mundanes. Muggles._

Ted grabbed his hand. "But I am," he announced. "In fact, I'm starving. Follow me."

He pulled a surprised Alec over to a small store which looked something like Magnus's bedroom back in Brooklyn – in other words, as though a rainbow had taken up residence there. It had stars hanging from its ceiling, and tables and chairs in bright primary colors around the room; behind a counter in the back, a tall wizard dressed in midnight-blue robes was idly tossing pancakes with his wand. The people eating in the shop all looked like they were ten years old or younger. Ted grinned at Alec's expression. "I used to come over here all the time when I was a little kid. Come on, do you want anything?"

"I'll have whatever you're having," Alec said dubiously, wondering what was the reason behind the abrupt change in Ted's mood, and followed him to the counter. He tuned out as Ted did the talking, watching with fascination as the pancakes hovered around in mid-air, guided by the wizard's wand. The wizard caught Alec staring and winked – and then, at a wave of his wand, a stack of pancakes shot halfway across the room and landed with an audible _splat_-clatter-clunk in the middle of an empty table, along with plates, cutlery, and a bottle of syrup.

"Thanks," Ted said, producing a few bronze coins from his pocket and handing them to the wizard. Alec gave him a few dollars with an apologetic shrug. "You can change... Muggle money, right?"

"Sure I can." Ted took the money and inspected it. "I never managed to understand Muggle money," he said, shaking his head. Then he shrugged and pocketed it, and promptly took a pancake and smothered it in syrup. Alec gaped.

Ted blinked. "What?"

"You're going to _eat_ that?" Alec asked.

Ted looked down at his food, which was now more syrup than pancake. "I need the sugar high," he said defensively.

"Oh." Alec began to eat – without syrup – and then took out his stele, trying to do it surreptitiously.

"What are you _doing_?" Ted hissed.

"Marking myself. Strength rune," Alec muttered under his breath as he tried and failed to look like he was doodling on himself. "I'm pretty sure it works better than a sugar high... there, done." He hastily pocketed the stele. Thankfully, nobody was staring.

He ate another pancake in silence, watching as Ted shoveled food into his mouth. After they were done, Ted went back to the counter and returned with a stack of something in his hands. "Chocolate frogs," he said, putting them down. "And some free bottled fire thingamabobs."

Alec leaned forward to look at the bottled fire. There were two small vials; one with an indigo flame inside, the other blue. He picked one up and read its label: "FARID & DUSTFINGER'S POCKET RAINBOW FIRE." And below that, in smaller print: "Collect all seven colors! Child-friendly; lights, does not burn."

"What does this mean?" Alec asked. "_Lights, does not burn._"

Ted took the other vial, studied it, and took out the cork, munching chocolate. Then he poured the flame into his hand as though it was liquid, and held it there. "Provides light," he drawled, letting the flames lick his fingers, "but does not burn. Quite self-explanatory."

Alec shook his head. "That's pretty amazing."

"It isn't." Ted put the fire back. "It's just pretty. My god-aunt Hermione could put fire in a bottle any day. Pick a color."

"What?"

Ted gestured at the two vials. "Indigo or blue?"

Alec started to protest, but Ted raised an eyebrow. "Indigo or blue, Alec?" he repeated. Alec blinked; it was the first time Ted had said his name since they came out of the fireplace.

"Blue," he said finally, and Ted gave him the blue fire. He poured it into his hands tentatively, half-expecting to catch fire, and held it up. He thought of Magnus, fingers giving off blue sparks, and smiled. "Cool. Thanks." He pocketed the fire.

As they got up to leave, Alec said, absentmindedly, "You know, we don't really need the fire."

Ted looked at him. "What, the bottled fire? Of course not." He drew his wand, frowning, and stared until the tip suddenly lit up. Alec's eyes immediately teared from the sudden light. "Thanks very much," he muttered, blinking vigorously.

"You're welcome!" Ted was grinning. "I always sucked at nonverbal spells. Now I'm finally getting the hang of them. I couldn't even do _Lumos_ once." He flicked his wand. "_Nox_."

He began to put the wand back into his pocket, and then paused. He turned suddenly to look at Alec. "Do you want to try?"

"Try what?"

He rolled his eyes. "The spell," he said. "Duh." Not waiting for further objection, he gave the wand to Alec. "It's really easy. A spell you learn at eleven years old. You sort of jerk it, like so" – he demonstrated –"and you say _Lumos_."

"_Lumos_," Alec said, feeling very stupid. Nothing happened. "_Lumos. Lumos _–"

The wand lit.

"Wicked. Now say _Nox_."

"_Nox._" The wand dimmed.

Ted shook his head. "Stupid wand," he said. "It gave me a hell of a lot more trouble when I first used it. Bloody traitor."

Alec laughed, and looked back down at the wand, suddenly feeling five years old again. "_Lumos. Nox. Lumos. Nox. Lumos. Nox –_"

"STOP IT." Ted snatched the wand back, but he was smiling. "You know, you're pretty good at this... hey, sorry I snapped at you earlier."

"What?" Alec blinked. "Oh. Right. No, it's fine... actually, before you taught me this spell thing, I was going to show you my witchlight stone." He pulled the stone out of his pocket. "It's a small one, but see, it provides light, too."

Ted looked at it interestedly. "Looks like your kind and my kind have stuff in common after all," he said, poking at the witchlight stone. "I guess light is popular everywhere. Nobody likes the dark, huh?"

_Demons lurk in the dark. _Alec abruptly stopped smiling. He stuffed the witchlight back into his pocket, trying not to think about Downworlders, about being a Downworlder. _We will find a cure. We will. _

"Alec?" Ted had noticed the change in his mood. Alec hastily changed the subject. "Ted, can I ask just _one_ question?"

"You just did," Ted said, and then he saw Alec's expression and rolled his eyes. "You really need to lighten up. Shoot."

It took Alec a few seconds to realize that by 'shoot' he meant yes. He took a deep breath. "How are we planning on getting to Hogsmeade?"

"Ah," Ted said, "excellent question." He sighed. "I'm afraid we'll have to apparate. I hate apparition. You hate apparition, too. Oh yes you do. Never mind that you've never tried it, you will hate it. By the way, you'll probably want to know – I've never tried tag-along apparition before."

Alec shook his head. "I have no idea what you're talking about. Unless you mean the whole fireplace thing?"

"No. I _said_ you've never tried it before, didn't I? The Floo Network is tapped, anyhow. Shouldn't matter, but just in case. We'll just have to pray that we don't splint."

"You haven't even told me what apparition is yet."

"Oh. Sorry." Ted grinned. "It's like teleportation. Something like that."

"And splinting?" Alec said, not sure if he wanted to know the answer. "It sounds painful."

"Oh, it's not too bad." Ted waved an arm carelessly. "You just leave parts of yourself behind, that's all."

He cackled evilly at Alec's expression. "I _know_."

After a few seconds of silence – Alec being speechless with horror – he continued. "So we'll apparate to Hogsmeade, and then we'll have to get to Hogwarts from there..."

"Hang on." Alec frowned, still looking slightly green. "In that case, why can't we just apparate into Hogwarts?"

"Can't," Ted said. "Not allowed."

"Is it sacred?" he asked, thinking of Idris, and Clary's disastrous attempt to get there by Portal. She'd fallen into Lake Lyn. He wondered if there was a lake outside this Hogwarts, too. (He later discovered that there was.)

"Sacred?" Ted was surprised. "No. Well, not exactly. It's... very well protected."

"And you're planning to break into it."

"Yep." Ted smiled. "Don't worry. I've broken _out_ of it many times before. Breaking in should only be about twice as hard."

"Broken out? Is it a jail?"

At this, Ted laughed out loud. "Not a jail, no. Something similar, though. It's a school... it's my old school." There was something in his voice that reminded Alec of how Hodge used to talk about Idris; with a tangible trace of nostalgia, a longing to return.

He forced himself to breathe slowly. "Right. And... when will we do this apparating thing?"

Ted tilted his head, looking thoughtful. "Digested those pancakes yet?"

"Have _you_ digested your pancakes? You ate twice the amount I did."

Ted considered. "Nope. But hey, we haven't got all day, now have we?" And he took Alec's hand. "I was thinking maybe right now."

"Hey! What are you – now? Can't you give me some time to– to– I don't know, mentally prepare?"

"Trust me," Ted said, "it's better if you don't think about it."

Alec took a breath to protest – and then suddenly the world disappeared.

x

"Maybe you should sit down," Ted said in his most reasonable voice. "It might help."

Alec swayed on his feet. "I'm fine," he insisted weakly.

Ted looked amused. "If you say so." He turned around to survey their surroundings. They were standing in a bare field seemingly in the middle of nowhere, with a tree here and there, and a clump of buildings very far off in the distance. Open field stretched on endlessly in every other direction.

"Well!" Ted said. "I think we're about a few miles from Hogsmeade. Nothing to worry about; just a few miles off target. And nobody here to help us, apparently. But overall I think it's quite a success."

Alec looked at him incredulously. "Why the hell is this situation considered a success?"

Ted paused to think. "Well, for one thing," he said finally, "we didn't splint."


	8. Chapter 8

"Clary! We're going to look for him."

Clary whirled around and found herself looking at Jace – not the Jace she had been used to lately, but Jace with no light in his eyes and no smile on his lips. She caught her breath. "Jace! Where have you been? You were gone for ages."

"No time for explanations. Listen, we're going to go look for him. Seen Izzy anywhere?"

She blinked. "What?"

"Alec," he said impatiently. "We're going to look for Alec. Where's Izzy?"

"Izzy's right there," Clary said with some relief. "I'm glad we're finally doing something, it's been hours. Do you want me to –"

But she didn't finish her sentence in time. Jace cursed under his breath. "Simon's with her," he muttered. "Just my luck." He grabbed her hand and led her over to where Simon and Isabelle were standing. "Where's Magnus?" he demanded when he was within earshot.

Isabelle shrugged. "No idea. Jace, what's wrong?"

"Where the hell is that warlock when we need him?" Jace said, and then – "Alec's missing, that's what's wrong, and we're going to look for him."

"We are?" Simon said. "How?"

Jace shook his head. "Not you," he said. "Us." Then he seemed to realize how harsh he was being, and he exhaled sharply. "Look, I'm sorry, okay? But we need to keep this quiet. Robert and Maryse don't know we're going, and I don't want any werewolves or vampires along for the ride. Even Daylighters," he added when Simon began to interrupt.

"But he's not one of them," Clary protested. "The vampires, I mean. He may be a vampire, but he was never really... he's always been part of _our_ crowd," she finished lamely. "Why–"

"Because," Jace said, "the less people there are to miss, the longer it will take until someone misses us. And too many of us would just make us slower – look, we don't have time, okay? I'm sorry, Simon," he said again, more sincerely this time. "Really."

But Simon only shrugged, looking resigned. "It's fine," he said. "I get where you're coming from. It makes sense, I guess. And – good luck."

Jace met his eye steadily and nodded. Without another word, he turned to Clary and Isabelle. "Are you guys good to go? Weapons?" He glanced at Isabelle, who nodded. "Good. Let's go."

"Where are we going, exactly?" Clary asked as she followed him out of the police station.

"Someplace quieter," Jace answered. He swerved to avoid a clump of giggling faerie folk and ducked into a dark alleyway. Clary had to jog to keep up with his long strides, her eyes straining to make things out in the dimness. She saw Jace take something small and flat out of his pocket. "It's not much, but it's the only thing I have right now," he explained. "I can't even remember why I have it with me. But it'll work."

Clary was bewildered. "What's it for? What _is_ it?"

"That's one of Alec's arrowheads," Isabelle put in. "Jace is going to use it to track him – right?" she added, with a tinge of uncertainty. "You've only tried it once before –"

"Don't have a choice. I've already done the spell – that's why I was away for so long, by the way," Jace told Clary. "Now be quiet."

There was a tense silence as Jace shut his eyes; Clary bit her lip, feeling thoroughly useless. Jace was frowning, his grip on the arrowhead very rigid. Then, suddenly, he blinked, and cursed under his breath.

"What? What happened? Did you see him?" Isabelle frowned. "It did work, right?"

"Oh, it worked. For about ten seconds. And then it went blank." He turned to Clary. "We need you to make a Portal," he said curtly. "You do have a stele?"

"I do, but – a Portal? I thought –"

"It's very risky, yes. But I have no idea where Alec is – I saw him, and I saw his surroundings, but I don't know where they are. I'll just have to picture it and step through, and you two will have to follow."

Isabelle looked very dubious. "Jace, I don't think –"

"There's no time, Izzy. The picture went blank – you do realize what that could mean. Clary?"

Clary hesitated. Jace was being reckless; she remembered her last disaster with a Portal, and the unbidden echo of Luke's words rang in her mind: _Just because you have power doesn't mean you know how to use it._

Jace looked sharply at her, noticing her hesitance. "Clary?" he said again, and his icy tone hit her like a slap. "If you don't want to do it, that's fine too. I could find another way."

"Jace," said Clary, reaching out to touch him; but he stiffened. "Don't."

"What's wrong? Why are you so angry? At me?"

"I'm not _angry_," Jace said shortly, and then seemed to deflate. "He and I are _parabatai_, Clary. I don't like not knowing what's happened to him. I don't like when a tracking spell goes blank. And those runes. I told you – I _told_ you it was a bad idea, didn't I?"

"Jace," Clary said. "Jace, I'm sorry."

But he didn't answer.

"Clary," Isabelle interrupted gently, though not without a tinge of badly concealed urgency in her voice. "Are you going to make the Portal?"

Clary bit her lip and pulled out her stele. She glanced at Jace, but he was looking away, his eyes hidden in shadows. Turning back around, she shut her eyes, concentrating. _Portal _– the rune came more easily this time, surfacing in her memory as sharp as though it was printed behind her eyelids.

When she was done, Jace stepped forward, staring into the shimmering space with his jaw set. "This had better not go wrong," he muttered, and then turned to look at Clary. His eyes were gentler now. "Thanks, Clary."

Before she could answer, he took her hand, and then turned to take Isabelle's hand. "Portals," he said, "generally take everyone in them to the same place – I think. But anyway, let's not take chances. And try not to think of anywhere. Let's not confuse the thing."

"Oh, hell," said Isabelle.

"I know, right?" said Jace. "Ready? Let's go."


	9. Chapter 9

"Last I saw him," said Magnus as he and Harry looked around, "he was with a boy who looked about seventeen years old, and both of them were covered in ashes."

They were inside the old house with the fireplace – it was only a single room – and Magnus was looking for clues, without much success. The other wizards had gone away, and it was just Harry with him, frowning.

"And they were in this room?" Harry repeated. "They must have used the fireplace, then. Lots of people do, for some reason. I suppose it's better than the one in Knockturn Alley..."

Magnus looked perplexed. "Used the fireplace for what?"

"Traveling." Harry smiled at Magnus's astonished expression. "We wizards have something called a Floo Network, where you can travel by fireplace... anyway, I suppose they must have gotten here from one of the fireplaces in New York." He paused. "I can't think of any teenagers I might know from New York... what did this boy look like?"

"Around seventeen," Magnus repeated. "Though I can't be sure," he added, thinking of his own appearance and its irrelevance to his age. "Are you wizards immortal?"

Harry laughed. "Nobody is immortal. And nobody has tried to become immortal, either, not since Voldemort's downfall years and years ago. Voldemort – he came close, in a way."

"_I'm_ immortal," Magnus informed him, not bothering to ask who Voldemort was. Harry looked astounded. "How old are you?"

"Oh, only about two hundred years old, I think," Magnus said convincingly, with practiced confidence. "Anyway, this boy seemed to be able to change his appearance. One moment his hair was brown, and the next it was black, so I can't say I know anything else for sure other than his approximate age."

"Wait a minute." Harry frowned. "He could change his hair color?"

Magnus nodded. "I think he could change his eye color too, but I'm not too sure. I couldn't see very well."

"What did he look like at first? Longish brown hair, sort of strawberry-blond? Lanky? About this high?" Harry lifted an arm.

Magnus nodded thrice. "So you know him, huh?"

"Yes. Well, I think so. It's hard to tell." Harry looked confused, and a little agitated. "I don't know what he might have been doing in New York, though."

"What's his name?" Magnus asked.

"Teddy Lupin."

Magnus shook his head. "Nope. Don't know anyone called Teddy Lupin. I don't suppose he's an Eidolon demon either," he added as an afterthought. "They wouldn't go near fireplaces, I don't think."

"What's an Eidolon demon?" Harry asked, then shook his head. "Actually, never mind. Teddy Lupin is a metamorphmagus, and according to you he may also be a werewolf – I strongly hope, for his sake, that you are wrong about that – but he is most definitely not any kind of demon. Listen, can you do the tracking thing again?"

Magnus nodded. "But only I will be able to see him," he warned.

Harry shrugged. "Better than nothing."

He watched as Magnus took out the stone he had used earlier, almost subconsciously stroking the small Alliance rune once before his long fingers curled around the cool surface. Magnus shut his eyes, letting the image slowly swirl into focus.

Alec and the other boy – Teddy Lupin – were outside a very peculiar house. It looked more like a shack than a proper home, and it had all kinds of things dangling from rafters that protruded from its roof. There were broomsticks, many broomsticks, and some pieces of splintered wood; baskets; ropes –

A voice cut into his consciousness, and the image disappeared. Magnus looked at Harry irritably. "What?" he said. "You're not supposed to talk to me while I'm doing this."

"Oh," said Harry with chagrin. "Well, did you see them?"

"Yes." Magnus proceeded to describe the shack in detail, studying Harry's expression. "You know the place, don't you?"

Harry nodded. "I'm fairly certain I do. It sounds like the residence of Hester Shaw... could you tell me more about what they were doing? And who they're with?"

"Don't interrupt this time," Magnus warned, shutting his eyes again. The image came back, with Alec still in the same place with the same people. This time Magnus observed a third person – a woman, dressed in a strange red hooded cloak with a scarf covering half her face. He let himself drift partly out of focus long enough to describe this woman to Harry, who nodded. "Definitely Hester Shaw... your Alec must be headed for Hogsmeade."

Magnus focused again on the image, watching with increasing trepidation as Teddy Lupin lifted something – a wand. He pointed it at Alec... said something...

With a flash of blinding white light, the image went blank. Magnus blinked, and then swore colorfully as he was plunged back into the dingy room by the fireplace.

Harry raised his eyebrows. "What happened?"

"It's gone blank." Magnus bit his lip, and dropped the stone back into his pocket, trying to think clearly. Harry frowned.

"Something tells me that's not a good thing..."

Magnus rolled his eyes. "It isn't."

"What does it mean?"

"Well," said Magnus flatly. "One thing it could mean is – he's dead."


	10. Chapter 10

Alec was not dead.

He was trudging along in the general direction of the clump of buildings, a little way behind Ted; it was beginning to get dark, but they were much nearer to the buildings now than they had been when they'd first started. They hadn't wanted to risk apparating again, so they were walking. Ted hadn't slowed – Alec wondered if he was using magic, or if his surprising stamina came from his lycanthropy. Alec had re-applied his Marks, adding a standard Speed rune over the faint scar left by Clary's stele, so he kept up well, despite his lack of sleep.

When he wasn't scowling sullenly into the distance, he watched Ted. The other boy was tall and lanky; skinny, Alec thought, made to look bigger than he actually was by his peculiar billowy robes. And he moved like Alec moved, like Jace and Isabelle moved – with the grace of a Shadowhunter. Or the agility of a Downworlder.

"You're very quiet," Ted observed after a while, breaking their long silence and turning around to look at Alec, walking backwards to do it.

Alec blinked, unsure about how to respond to this odd statement. "I'm just... thinking," he said eventually, which was mostly true. Then he added, partly to make up for his silence and partly out of genuine curiosity, "So, this" – he gestured at Ted – "this is your usual look?"

Ted looked mildly surprised, but recovered quickly, falling back so he was beside Alec instead of walking backwards to face him. "Yeah," he said, and paused. "Nice, isn't it? I switch it up sometimes, of course, if I get bored. Or just to take the piss. But this is my default, so to speak."

Alec nodded slowly. "Why?" he asked after a moment.

Ted laughed. "Mostly so I don't confuse people by changing every day," he said, tilting his head. "Also because it gets kind of hard to keep coming up with new looks."

"No, I mean why this look," Alec amended. "Brown-blond hair and gray eyes and everything. Just because?"

"Oh, that. Nah..." Ted looked away, into the distance. "My dad looked like this, apparently, when he was alive. Just with more wrinkles and scars, but I figure I could do without those for now."

Alec flinched. "Oh. Sorry. To have brought it up, I mean – I didn't know..."

"'S alright." Ted smiled. "My mom's dead too, but I have it better than a lot of people. I have a godfather, my adopted family is great..." He trailed off for a while. Alec thought he wasn't going to say anything else, but then Ted suddenly looked up again. "My father was a werewolf," he said quietly. "I got the metamorphmagus part from my mother."

"Really?" Alec stopped, hesitant. "Wait. So... you were born a werewolf?"

Ted laughed humorlessly. "No," he said, and his tone of voice told Alec not to pry further.

As they walked on in silence, Alec suddenly realized that Ted reminded him of Jace. It wasn't just because they were both orphaned – there was something else about him... He had the same confidence – arrogance – the same guarded calm, though Ted's shield was less carefully polished, less impenetrable. And Ted's gray eyes carried the same hints of fear and vulnerability that Alec saw so rarely in Jace's tawny ones. Alec had come to realize, over the past few months, that everyone was afraid of something; that people like Jace and Ted only disguised it better. He found himself staring, and then blinked as Ted abruptly turned to look at him.

But Ted didn't seem to notice that Alec had been staring. He wore a thoughtful expression. "Have you ever wanted to be just like your parents, Alec?" he asked.

Alec was taken aback. "Um," he said, "sure, I guess. My parents are... pretty cool people."

Ted nodded, but he didn't say anything; there was another long silence, and Alec was just beginning to think about what an erratic conversationalist his new friend was when he spoke again.

"No, I wasn't born a werewolf... or at least, I don't think I was. Not completely." Ted's tone was eerily bitter, and very clearly heartbroken. Alec fought to suppress a shiver. Ted stared straight ahead, his expression contemplative and neutral. "A few months ago – at the end of my final school year – I began to think, almost obsess over my father's lycanthropy. I knew it was irrational. I knew there was something wrong. But I couldn't stop.

"I thought it was only a phase, so I continued with life; did my N.E.W.T's, and won Gryffindor the Quidditch Cup, and graduated and all of that."

Alec didn't understand half of what Ted was saying, but something about the way Ted spoke stopped him from interrupting. "Still, things grew worse. I had screaming nightmares... and then one night, the night of the full moon, I was sleepwalking. I woke up in the middle of nowhere, and there was a werewolf leaning over me.

"I don't remember very much. Pain – a lot of pain, obviously. And a lot of running. Blood; not my blood, but the blood of other creatures. Thankfully, I don't think there were any human beings around." Alec flinched. "Then, nothing – and then I woke up not far from where we are, now." Ted slowed momentarily, looking at his surroundings with glazed eyes, and Alec couldn't tell if it was bitter regret or something else. He quickly looked away.

"I kept it a secret. How could I tell anyone? I didn't know what to do. That whole month, I was a wreck... I pretended to be ill. And then I found that doorway to New York. I was drawn to it, for some reason. It was far from home, and the police station was abandoned, and there was something about it..."

Alec bit his lip. "It's the haunt of the New York werewolf pack," he said softly.

He didn't see Ted's reaction – Ted's face was shrouded in shadow, lit very dimly in the dusk – but he heard his answer, though he said it almost in a whisper.

"I chose that place to hide. To phase. And, well... the rest you know."

For a long time, neither of them spoke. Alec thought of Simon, Simon before he went back to the Hotel Dumont; how he hadn't been a vampire that night in the Seelie Court, how the lure had eventually taken him for the Night Children. He began to say it wasn't entirely Ted's fault, that he couldn't have fought, but what came out of his mouth was entirely different.

"Ted... does anyone else know about your secret?"

At last, Ted turned to look at Alec again. He shook his head. "Nobody but you."

Alec closed his eyes for a moment. "If it makes you feel any better," he said finally – and his voice, too, was no more than a murmur – "I know what it's like, to keep a secret from people you love, because you're scared, or ashamed."

For a moment, Ted looked as though he was going to ask something, hesitating. But then he glanced up, and stopped walking. "Look," he said.

Alec looked. They had reached the edge of the clump of buildings; in front of them stood a ramshackle house that looked as though it might grow sideways, with sinister-looking wildflowers and vines growing all over the garden, and broomsticks seeming to hang off the creepers that grew on the walls. There was a crooked sign that had been driven into the ground, letters carved crudely into the wood: "AIRHAVEN AVIATION." Beneath that, "FAMILY BROOMSTICKS AND BALLOONS."

The ghost of a smile lit up Ted's face, and his eyes glinted in the half-light. "Want to go ask for directions?"


	11. Chapter 11

"That," Alec declared with certitude, "was seriously scary."

Ted grinned. "She did give us directions," he said. "At least now we know where we're going. Could have gone worse."

"Somehow I don't have any trouble believing that. Who was she, anyway? I've never seen a weirder house than hers, either."

"That was Hester Shaw. Quite an amazing witch, I hear. She runs a business making family broomsticks of sorts. Kind of like aircrafts, or hovercrafts, or hot-air balloons."

Alec gaped. "So you do actually fly on broomsticks?"

"Sure we do. Well, mostly broomsticks, anyway. There's even a game. But there's other stuff, too. My god-granddad once had a flying car, you know."

"You're kidding me."

"Am not. Also, my godfather's godfather owned a flying motorcycle. And there are Thestrals and Hippogriffs and dragons..."

Alec shook his head. "How do you keep this stuff from the... what did you call them? – Muggles? Do you have glamours, too?"

"Glamours?" Ted looked puzzled.

"We Shadowhunters have glamours to make ourselves invisible to mundanes," Alec explained. "I expect you have similar things, otherwise there'd be –"

Ted smacked a palm to his forehead. "_Why didn't I think of that before?_" he exclaimed.

"Uh-oh," Alec said, as Ted pulled out his wand. "What are you doing?"

"Simple Disillusionment Charm," said Ted. "Don't worry, it won't hurt. Stand _still_." He raised his wand and pointed it straight at Alec's nose. "This will make it harder for anyone to follow us. Or follow you."

Alec shut his eyes and felt an odd sensation, as though an egg had been cracked over his head. "What just happened?"

Ted laughed, and Alec noted with a frown that Ted didn't look him in the eye when he did it. He was about three feet off. "Look at yourself," he said. Alec looked – and did a double take.

"You know," he said after a time, through gritted teeth, "when we Shadowhunters use glamours, we can actually _see each other._"

"Really?" Ted sounded genuinely – and infuriatingly – indignant. "How _convenient_. I wish I could see you. I don't even know where you are any more."

Alec groaned. "This is _so_ weird," he complained as they set off again, the grass flattening underneath his invisible feet.

Ted grinned in his general direction. "Keep talking," he said. "That way I know you're still here."

Alec looked down again, feeling thoroughly disoriented. He scowled.

"Ted Lupin," he said, enunciating very carefully. "Your plan, whatever it is, had better be VERY. BLOODY. GOOD."


	12. Chapter 12

Jace hated Portals. Not for any good reason, of course – he just didn't enjoy the whirling, and the plummeting sensation, and the uncertainty as to whether or not he was going to land on a flat surface or a pile of rocks.

Right now, though, he was more concerned with whether or not he would land on the right continent. Something told him that if Clary could Portal to Idris with a memory from a dream, then he could certainly Portal to wherever Alec was with a picture from a tracking spell; then again, Clary was Clary. Valentine Morgenstern's daughter. _Not my sister_ – the thought still brought him a kick of adrenaline, even now, flying through space in search of his adopted brother and best friend. _Not my sister. Not my sister... Not my sister_ –

WHAM. He hit the ground with a violent jolt, rudely awakened from his reverie, and lay dazed for a second before the object of his daydreams crashed down on top of him. Jace howled.

A few meters away, Isabelle was brushing dirt off herself. Jace saw her blurry black hair swinging as she shook her head. "Really," she said with some exasperation, "talk about an undignified landing."

Jace groaned as Clary rolled off him. "I think I broke a rib," he announced gingerly to no one in particular. Propping himself up on one elbow, he lifted his shirt, drawing his stele to trace an _iratze_ on his side. Clary looked on with chagrin. "Sorry," she said, looking sheepish.

No longer injured, Jace waved an arm. "An eye for an eye," he said chivalrously. "You never did get back at me for landing on top of you, that first time you Portaled into Luke's garden."

Clary grinned. "That's true," she agreed, standing up slowly and evidently finding herself unhurt. Apparently Jace made a good crash mat. He slid his stele back into his belt.

"So," Clary said, "are we in the right place?"

Jace got to his feet and looked around. For a long moment none of them spoke, the two girls watching Jace expectantly. He was silent and still, his expression completely blank but for a small frown as he examined their surroundings. Just when Clary began to say something, he clapped his hands once.

"Yes," he said cheerfully, with absolute certainty. "Yes, we are. It would sound cooler if I said, 'I can feel it,' but really it's because I'm fairly sure there aren't many of _those_ in your regular backyard."

He pointed.

They were standing in a sort of back garden, and with them, just a few meters away, stood a bird. Not a normal, common bird – a giant bird, taller than Jace was, with the sleek and powerful hindquarters of a horse, and a very intimidating presence. Jace wondered exactly how they had managed to not notice it for so long.

Behind him, Isabelle whistled.

"That's not a demon, is it?" Clary said, with raised eyebrows. "Or is it a centaur? Or a griffin?"

"It's not a demon." Jace moved a little closer, tilting his head. The bird watched him through narrowed eyes. Glancing down, he saw that it was tethered by a heavy chain to a post in the ground. "And it looks like an eagle-horse hybrid, so no, not a centaur or a griffin, either. Maybe a griffin-centaur, if that makes sense. Anyway, it doesn't matter. What matters is –"

But he never got to say what mattered, because suddenly he'd taken a step too close, and the creature let out a loud screech, and he leaped away not a second too soon; its huge wings just brushed his face by the tips of their feathers –

A door flew open. Jace hadn't noticed it before – it was completely covered in dark green vines, just like the rest of the wall. He immediately recognized the person in the doorway: the strange person from his tracking spell image. She was very striking, impossible to miss – clad in an outlandish-looking maroon coat, with her face wrapped in a red shawl. And a scowl on her face not too dissimilar to Alec's regular one, except currently a lot more irritated.

"GET OFF MY GARDEN," she said furiously, brandishing what looked like a stele. Her voice was surprisingly raspy. Jace realized, as he was violently blasted off his feet along with Clary and Isabelle, that the stele was in fact a wand. A magic wand. The kind you read about in Mundie fairy tales. His mouth fell open even as he was suspended in mid-air, and he landed with a thump just outside the garden gate. He felt blood well up on his cheek where a wire snare had nicked it.

He sat up, dazed, and found the wand pointing into his face. "What do they teach you in Care of Magical Creatures these days? Don't you know how to treat hippogriffs? And what are you doing near mine, anyway? Can't you read?" The woman jabbed her free hand toward a sign on the lopsided gate. "_Private property._ See? And you three are the _third_ party to come here unannounced today. I don't care if it's Harry Potter come to visit or scruffy-looking boys with tattoos, you still have to –"

"Tattoos?" Jace interrupted sharply, and lifted his arm, pushing back his sleeve. The glamour peeled off like water running down his skin, revealing his heavily inked arm. "Like these?"

"Jace," Isabelle said warningly, but he ignored her. The cloaked woman narrowed her eyes. "Yes, like those," she said. Behind her, the eagle-horse – the hippogriff, Jace thought – stamped a taloned foot impatiently. "Turned up here asking for directions, and then another idiot with glitter in his hair and paint on his face comes with Harry Potter asking if I've seen them. And you" – she scowled at Jace, and then at Isabelle, and then at Clary – "you're looking for him too, your tattooed friend, aren't you?"

"Actually–" Isabelle began, but the woman cut her off.

"Hogsmeade is that way," she said, jabbing her wand at her garden path, or what passed for a path. A blazing trail of light appeared briefly before dimming to a dull glow, leading away into darkness. "Now if you're not going to buy anything, get off my land and tell your friends to keep their games of hide-and-seek clear of here. Understand?"

And she vanished. The door slammed shut.

"Good grief," Jace said.

They turned to look at each other, staying well clear of the hippogriff's end of the fence.

"Well," said Isabelle, "now we know which way to go, at least. And we also know that Magnus Bane is looking for Alec. Unless, of course, the 'idiot with glitter in his hair and paint on his face' is someone else."

Clary snorted. "You think?"

"I've got an idea," Jace said. "Let's not hang around here any longer. We might get hit by another shower of gracious hospitality." He grabbed Clary's hand. "Come on. Where did she say this path thing led to again?"

"Hog-something," said Isabelle. "This is pretty cool, actually. Follow the path of light – wait." She interrupted herself mid-sentence. "Shit. We've been so _stupid_. Why didn't we think of this before?"

"Think of what, exactly?" said Jace irritably, kicking at the path. It shimmered slightly, but didn't move, like hovering, phosphorous mist. "Following the path of light? It wasn't –"

"No, idiot," Isabelle said, waving an arm. "Following the _warlock_. If Magnus is chasing Alec and we can't track Alec, we can try chasing Magnus instead, right?"

"That's a great idea, Izzy." Jace's voice dripped sarcasm. "So how do you suggest we Follow The Warlock? Do you have anything to track him with? I don't think he owns any underwear. Don't ask why. I just have a feeling. Some glitter, perhaps? Would that work, do you think?"

Isabelle looked crestfallen. "I forgot about that part," she admitted forlornly. "Oh well. It would have been a good plan..."

She trailed off as they walked, the glowing path disappearing behind them as though candles were snuffed out wherever they put their feet. Jace wondered if the path was leading them the right way, or if the woman had just wanted them out of her sight. He lagged behind, taking the arrowhead out of his pocket, trying to find Alec. Nothing.

"Jace?" It was Clary. She had taken out her witchlight stone; it was getting dark. She held it out in front of her, and Jace squinted in the bright light. Her green eyes were round, concerned. "What are you doing?"

Jace sighed, pocketing the arrowhead and running to catch up. "Nothing," he said. He wished he knew where they were going.


	13. Chapter 13

By the time they got to the end of the glowing path, it was fully dark, and all three of them had their witchlights out. Jace held his stone up and squinted at a signboard. "Welcome to Hogsmeade," he read, his voice weary from the hour but sharpened by the progress.

They were standing at the beginning of a wide street, lined by buildings on each side. The buildings were mostly dark, with only one or two lighted windows in the near distance, and the street faded into blackness ten feet ahead. It was eerily quiet. Jace wondered if it was past midnight yet.

Clary held her witchlight stone up higher and craned her neck. "Something tells me Alec isn't lurking around here any more," she said.

Isabelle rolled her eyes. In the bleached light of the witchlight stones her irises looked very black, and her features were cast into shadow in all the wrong places. Jace suddenly thought of Halloween in New York, going trick-or-treating with Alec and Isabelle just to infuriate their parents and Hodge. The only difference was, Alec had been there – and New York was never this dark or this quiet. Not where the mundies were, anyway. But this place –

"This place is so weird," Isabelle said, taking the words right from Jace's mouth. She frowned. "What do we do now?"

"I don't know." Jace was disoriented. Usually Isabelle and Alec led the hunts, and he was the one who charged forward without thinking, surviving only with sheer skill and determination. He didn't like an Isabelle Lightwood who wasn't _certain_.

They were silent for a moment. In the end Clary started forward. "Whatever we do next, it's not going to be done standing around here looking suspicious," she said, but there was doubt in her voice.

"Excellent logic, Clary. Not that there's anyone out here to see us." But Jace followed her anyway, glad to be doing something. "Speaking of which, do you think our glamours work in this place? Wherever this place is?"

Isabelle turned to look at him. "What do you mean? Of course our glamours work."

"You _know_ what I mean." Jace tried to sound nonchalant, but couldn't hide the slightly spooked edge to his tone. "That woman had a wand – a real wand – and a hybrid freak bird for a pet. I really don't think she's a mundie, do you? Not a warlock, either, seeing as she obviously didn't know what these were." He held up his hand. The open eye was stark and black on the back of his right hand, but most of his other runes had been used up, leaving only translucent white scars. "I don't think we're in the world we know, Izzy, and you don't think so, either."

Isabelle bit her lip. "It freaks me out," she said quietly. "First Alec goes missing, and then his tracking spell goes blank, and now we're in some strange other world with eagle-horses, and witches, and –"

"Don't." Jace's tone was flat. He shook his head. "It freaks me out when you're freaking out."

Clary smiled halfheartedly and took Jace's hand. "We'll find him," she whispered, and he was surprised to find that she didn't sound at all afraid. She said it with conviction as she looked up at him with calm eyes – tired, but with a spark of mettle in them that never really disappeared. Not when she was looking at him.

"You really mean that, don't you?" Jace said, trying not to sound awed. She was every bit as strong as her mother or Maryse was, so different from the uncertain girl he had met in Pandemonium so long ago.

And so beautiful when she smiled.

"Of course I mean it," she said. "I speak from experience, you know."

Jace started, looking astonished for a moment, and then he began to laugh. "I only just realized," he said in amazement. "It's not the first time you've discovered a new world, is it? And it isn't even the –"

"_Shh!_" Isabelle hissed sharply, and they both instantly shut up, eyes wide and alert. Almost unconsciously, Jace's hand slid to his belt and closed around a seraph blade. He glanced at Isabelle. _What is it?_ said his eyes.

But they all saw before Isabelle said anything. It turned out to be a boy – no older than Max had been, with a crown of flaming red hair lit by a long candle. He held the candle up, stopping to stare at them two meters away.

"What are _those_?" he asked, his voice expressing nothing but curiosity. He was looking at their witchlight stones. Jace glanced around and realized the boy had been in a garden surrounded by a short hedge. He wondered why he hadn't noticed him sooner.

He began to tell the boy that they were glow-in-the-dark toys, but the boy interrupted. "D'you have more? Can _I_ have one?"

Isabelle gave Jace a warning look and bent down to face the boy, smiling sweetly. "Can you help us first?" she said. "We're looking for someone and we need help finding him."

The boy frowned. "You're playing hide and seek at this time of the night? You'll _never_ find anyone."

"Not hide and seek," Isabelle said gravely. "We think he got lost. Maybe you saw him."

"What did he look like?" the boy said, apparently forgetting the stones. He looked like Max, Jace realized with a pang of sadness – Mac when he or Isabelle included him in their conversations, like he was seventeen and not seven. He watched quietly as Isabelle worked her magic.

"He's about this high," she said, straightening up and raising an arm, "with black hair just like mine. Except short, of course."

Jace remembered the witch earlier. "He had tattoos," he put in hopefully. "Strange ones, like these."

The boy's eyes widened, but he shook his head. "I haven't seen anyone like that," he said, frowning. "But a lot of people come over here. If he wasn't visiting anyone, he probably went over to the Hog's Head for the night. It's a pretty long way from here, though." Then he brightened, very suddenly. "Wait here," he told them, and dashed back toward the garden and into a small house. The light from the candle disappeared as the door closed.

Jace turned to Isabelle, who shrugged, mystified. Ten seconds later the boy came out again, carrying a backpack in one hand and his candle in the other. He set the pack down and struggled to unzip it with one hand, finally getting it open and offering the three of them... a bottle of juice each.

Jace blinked.

Isabelle and Clary were equally nonplussed. "Er, thanks," Clary said, trying and failing to sound enthusiastically appreciative.

"It's really nice," the boy said eagerly. "I thought you might be thirsty. No offense, but you all don't look that great. Anyway, try it!"

Jace looked skeptically at Isabelle, who shrugged. _Just humor him_, her eyes seemed to say, and she unscrewed her cap. So did Clary. They drank the juice, slowly. The boy turned to Jace, his eyes oddly big and round, and Jace sighed. He unscrewed the cap of his own bottle.

The juice tasted completely normal. It wasn't a big bottle. They finished quickly.

"Thanks," Jace began to say, but he noticed that Clary had a strange expression on her face. Isabelle, too, looked slightly queasy.

"What's wrong?" Jace said nervously. "Clary? Izzy?" He turned to the boy with a growing sense of suspicion. "What did you just give us?"

"I'm sorry!" the boy said, just as Jace's stomach lurched. His vision blurred as he saw the boy pull a big camera out of his backpack. "My sister paid me to do it! Three Galleons. I couldn't resist. It's not harmful, just –"

Jace would have lunged at the boy, but he felt himself shrinking. In two seconds, the world around him had grown huge – and in front of him, amidst knee-high blades of grass, stood two mice. Brown, furry mice.

Clary and Isabelle.

Somewhere high above him, a camera flashed.


	14. Chapter 14

Alec woke up to the sound of fire crackling. It took him a few seconds to remember where he was. He sat up abruptly, letting the threadbare sheets fall off his shoulders, and saw Ted sitting in front of a small fire, poking his wand at the flames. At the sound of Alec's mattress creaking, he turned around.

"Good to see _you_ slept well," he said wryly, but his eyes were bright and awake. "These Hog's Head beds aren't exactly fantastically comfortable. By the way, your hair looks great."

Alec ran a hand through his hair, which he knew was sticking up around his head in its usual messy fashion. "Doesn't matter," he mumbled, blinking blearily through his fringe. "I don't really care how I look..."

He tried to remember last night. It was all a blur; they had both been exhausted when they finally arrived in Hogsmeade. Ted had bought more chocolate for dinner, with Pumpkin Pasties and ordinary orange juice. The last thing he remembered before falling asleep was Ted, blinking sleepily at him in the dim firelight.

"We are a few miles closer to our cure tonight," he'd murmured softly. "Good night, friend... It's nice having company, after all. Maybe. I don't know. Good night, Alec Lightwood." Alec had wondered if he'd had too much chocolate.

He looked perfectly sane now. "You don't need to bother about how you look," he said, flicking his wand. A jet of water shot out of its end into the fire, making it hiss. "Damn it. _Incendio_, you stupid piece of wood, not – okay, good." He looked satisfied as the fire sprang back to life, aided by a spark from his wand. Then he turned on Alec, without warning, and Alec felt the cracking egg sensation again as he disappeared before his own eyes.

"Ugh," he said, looking down at himself – or the lack of himself – glumly. "This thing is a pain. And if you accidentally hose me down like you did with the fire, I will kill you."

"You can't," Ted said matter-of-factly. He waved an arm, and a few butterflies shot out of the tip of his wand, disappearing one by one. "For one thing, it's illegal. For another thing, you're too nice to kill me. For a third, I won't hose you down. Disillusionment Charms are a specialty of mine. They're not standard schoolwork. I just mastered them for the purposes of myself and James Potter's schoolboy adventures. I'm very good at them; I can even make you semi-translucent, for now. See?" He waved his wand again.

Alec reappeared on the bed – or almost reappeared. He was, indeed, semi-translucent. Like a ghost, or a poltergeist. Or a Projection. _So much colored air, so to speak_.

"Great, now I can see you properly," Ted said, grinning. "James is even better at this."

"James?" Alec asked, only half-interested. He was looking down at himself, wearing an expression that was in equal parts fascinated and uncomfortable.

Ted stood up, having finally gotten the fire properly going, and flopped down next to Alec on the bed. "James Potter Junior. You'll meet him in a minute." He looked very happy at the prospect, bouncing slightly as he swung his dangling legs. Alec stared down at Ted's grinning face, surprised at how manic Ted was being. The boy was unpredictable if nothing else. "You like him a lot," he observed.

"He's like my brother," Ted said, to the ceiling. "My godfather's son, see. And my best friend. We got up to all kinds of nonsense when I was in school. He's younger, so he's still in Hogwarts. I didn't think I'd get to see him again so soon." He turned to look at Alec. "We were working on a new secret passageway for the whole of last year, but we didn't finish it in time. It took a lot more work getting around the school's protection charms than we'd thought at first. He sent me an owl last week saying it's finally ready and I'm totally stoked that we get to –"

At the word 'stoked', the fire suddenly flared a bright acid green, lighting up the room briefly like colored lightning. Alec jumped, and Ted sat up. "Excellent!" he said. "He's here."

"He's what? Who? What the – holy _shit_!" Alec did a double take, gaping at the fire. "Ted, what the hell is that?"

"It's a head," Ted said, grinning from ear to ear. He got off the bed and sat down on the hearthrug, facing the fire. Sitting in the flames was, indeed, a head. "Hello, my friend!" Ted said merrily. "Got my owl, did you? I was afraid she wouldn't make it in time. Alec, meet James Potter Junior. James, meet Alec Lightwood."

The head looked at Alec and winked. "Hello, Alec Lightwood."

Alec stared.

The head laughed at his dumbstruck expression. "Don't worry," said James Potter Junior. "It takes a while to get used to. Ted didn't say much about you in his note, but he told me you were a muggle, or sort of a muggle. So it must be really hard for you to digest all this. Anyway, welcome to the wizarding world. And I do have a body. Just for the record."

"Good to know," Alec said weakly.

James looked at Ted. "I take it you didn't tell him I was going to visit this way," he said dryly. "You're as evil as ever, you know that."

Ted looked indignant. "I wanted to give him a surprise," he said defensively. "I love surprises."

"I hate surprises," Alec muttered.

"You're no fun, Alec." Ted shook his head, and then turned back to James. "Anyway, we have to hurry. I'm pretty sure Hog's Head fireplaces are tapped, and I don't think you have your fireplace to yourself, either, do you?"

The head bobbed. "I do, actually," said James. "For now, at least. I managed to burn myself during Potions, so I got out early. After this we've got Charms, but that's the last lesson for the day. I reckon you can come over after that."

"Excellent," Ted said again. "Will Vicky be there?"

James rolled his eyes. "I haven't told her yet, because you didn't say to in your note, but I'll make sure she's there."

"Who's Vicky?" Alec asked, beginning to weary of trying to keep up.

"Vicky," said Ted, "is the second reason I am so excited about going back to Hogwarts. Also the most beautiful thing on the planet to date. Also probably the first reason I'm alive. Also someone you should really keep your hands off of. Also –"

"TED." James scowled. "We haven't got all day, remember?"

"Absolutely right." Ted grinned. "Sorry. Okay. So when does Charms end? You'll meet me at the Hogwarts entrance? How are we sneaking Alec up to the Gryffindor Tower?"

James looked disgusted. "What kind of mischief-maker do you think I am?" he sneered. "_Obviously_ I have all that already figured out. I'll meet you inside the tunnel. Wait outside the Hogsmeade entrance for me. Don't worry about timing, I'll send Sol up when we're good to go. And I stole a double broom from the broom shed, so you and Alec can use that." He turned to Alec, smiling. "You ever fly before?"

Alec was glad to be unruffled for once. He nodded. "On a vampire cycle," he said. "My brother has one. I'm fairly good at it."

"A _vampire_ cycle?" said James, raising his eyebrows. "O-_kay_. Well, good, because then riding the passenger broom with Ted should be no problem for you. Not that I know what vampire cycles are like. I'm just assuming."

"He won't have a problem," Ted said confidently. "As long as he lets me steer anyway. I'll fly slowly, so he'll be fine. Those brooms are quite reliable." He winked at Alec. "In fact, you've already met their maker."

"Cool," Alec said, grinning. He liked flying; it was the first thing in this new world that he was excited by. He wasn't too sure about broomsticks, especially broomsticks made by the angry scarved witch they had asked for directions from, but it was certainly a much more favorable idea than traveling by fireplace or apparition again.

James laughed. "Glad you think so. Alright, any questions?"

"Yes." Alec hesitated. "Just... aren't we better off breaking in at night? I mean, not that I know a lot about your world, but break-ins are conventionally conducted in the night. With darkness for cover and all that."

"It's because it's conventional," Ted said. James glared at him before turning to Alec. "You do have a point," he said. "At night, almost everyone is sleeping – but not everyone is." He winked. "People like Ted and I, for example, would be the most harmless things awake. In the silence of night-time, even a little bit of noise we make is enough to wake the dead. Or worse, the caretaker."

Before Alec had time to put his finger on what was offbeat about this last statement, Ted interrupted. "Ah, but that might not be that much of a bad thing," he said blithely. "Waking the dead, I mean. We're going to have to interrogate them anyway."

Alec gaped at him. "Ghosts? There are ghosts as well?"

The flickering firelight seemed to glint in Ted's eyes as he smiled. "You heard me."

"Ghosts?" James repeated, perplexed. "Going to all this trouble to talk to ghosts? Now I _really_ want to know what you're up to this time."

Alec looked at him, startled. "You don't know?"

"No, he doesn't know. Not yet," Ted interrupted, glancing sharply at Alec. "I'll tell him later. And I have a question, too. Why are you sending Sol to fetch us? I have a feeling it isn't just because Sol is less recognizable than a Hogwarts kid playing truant."

James grinned. "Nope. It isn't. And I'm not telling you why, either. It's a surprise. Since you love surprises so much."

This time, Ted's eyes seemed to glint on their own.

"_Awesome._"


	15. Chapter 15

There was a heavy mist hovering over Hogsmeade as Ted and Alec set out to find the passageway into Hogwarts. Ted said that this was convenient, because it meant he could let Alec remain semi-translucent. In the fog, it wasn't much easier to see him than it would have been had he been completely invisible.

On the other hand, it was also much harder for them to see where they were going, let alone find a hidden tunnel. They did alright until they came to the edge of what looked like a small grove. Alec looked at it, and then looked at Ted, waiting for him to lead the way. But Ted looked confused.

"What's up?" Alec asked apprehensively.

Ted frowned. "Firstly, everything looks the same," he said, sounding more annoyed than anything else. He took a step forward to place a hand on one of the strange-looking trees. Its bark was jet-black, covered in a fine moss that looked like suede. Alec wasn't sure if he had imagined it, but he thought he saw a trail of very dark green moss, where Ted had run his fingers across. The other boy frowned. "Secondly, I don't remember – oh." His face lit up. "Hey there, Sol. Didn't see you coming."

He appeared to be talking to thin air. Alec was confused for a moment, wondering if Sol was invisible, too, before he realized Ted was actually talking to a cat in the distance. Its mottled pelt came into focus as it got closer, two pale yellow eyes blinking owlishly up at him through the mist. Ted bent down to scratch its ears affectionately.

"Oh," said Alec.

"Oh what?"

"Oh, he's a cat."

Ted looked amused. "So he is," he agreed mildly. "Sorry, I forgot to tell you about that part."

"Doesn't matter." Alec looked a little dubiously at Sol for a few more seconds before addressing Ted. "So, uh... he's meant to help us get into the tunnel thing, right?"

"Yeah," Ted said, nodding, and then froze. "Oh, right!" he exclaimed suddenly. "I'm so _stupid_. _That_ must be why that thing's here. It's what Sol is helping us with!"

Alec shook his head. "I'm lost," he said, irritated. "What thing?"

"What what thing? _That_ thing, you blind dimwit," Ted said, pointing. "That plant thing that's all over the ground. Come on!" He started to walk forward, then paused.

"What now?" said Alec.

"I just now realized that the plant's probably there for a reason," Ted said slowly. He glanced at Sol. "Which way, kitty?"

To Alec's surprise, Sol waved his long tail and started forward. As they followed, Alec got a closer look at their surroundings. 'That plant thing' turned out to be the most bizarre species of foliage Alec had ever seen.

It was a carpet of what looked like vines, tangled together and sprawled across the ground in huge patch. The vines were jet-black, and as thick as ropes. But the strangest thing about them was not their color or their anatomy – it was the fact that they moved, slowly and fluidly like very lethargic snakes. Alec swallowed.

"Something tells me we're going to have to step on this stuff," he said resignedly.

"Well, _duh_," said Ted. "Look."

Alec looked. Sol the cat had his nose to the ground – or the vines on the ground – and was sniffing the plant carefully before taking small steps forward. Alec looked closer and realized he hadn't imagined the moss turning green earlier. Whatever made it change color was in this plant as well – Sol had left behind a trail of dark green vines.

"We're meant to follow the trail..." Ted trailed off, frowning. "Anything bulky on you?" he asked Alec abruptly, not taking his eyes off Sol.

"Er, no." Alec looked at him as though he was mad. "Can't you just, like, conjure something?" He decided not to ask what Ted wanted a bulky object for.

Ted clapped his hands together. "Fantastic idea," he agreed. "However, I won't conjure anything. There is a simpler way." He pulled his wand out of his pocket. "_Accio big rock!"_

Nothing happened for a few seconds. Then, as Alec began to say something, a rock the size of his skull came flying in their direction like a missile. It was headed straight for their heads. Years of Shadowhunter training kicked in, and without thinking, Alec swung his arm at it, knocking it away before it beheaded him.

"Dam it," he spat as the rock landed a few feet away. "That hurt. What the hell were you –"

He broke off, staring.

The rock was sinking. It was being tugged down by the black vines, which were stretching like catapult rubber bands – and then the vines snapped back, and the rock shot up into the air.

It took a full ten seconds to come back down again. And then, just as it was about to land, a vine shot up and whacked it hard, sending it flying away into the foggy distance. Alec raised an eyebrow.

"Correction," he said. "We're meant to follow the trail _exactly_."

For a few moments, Ted didn't respond. Alec wondered if he was shocked into silence, but a closer look revealed that he was grinning manically.

"James Potter, I love you," he said with relish.

He started forward again, carefully following the green path that Sol was leaving. Alec trailed after him, shaking his head. "You're absolutely crazy," he informed Ted, who grinned some more. He spread his arms wide and shrugged. "I've never claimed otherwise."

They walked only about twenty meters before Sol came to a halt. He was sniffing and pawing at the ground, the tip of his tail flicking slowly. Alec, who had known Church all his life, could tell from Sol's body language that he was paying close attention to something under the vines. Suddenly his white paw shot out, and he prodded at something below the surface.

A small patch of vines next to where they were flashed briefly, a very bright acid green, before fading back to black. Sol looked up at Ted and let out a loud _meow_. He bunched his hindquarters, gaze intent, before leaping neatly onto where the green patch had been. And in a few seconds, he was gone – swallowed up into the vines.

Alec's eyes flew wide open and he turned to Ted, wondering what to do – but Ted looked perfectly unperturbed. In fact, he looked fascinated. "Let's go," he said, and jumped after Sol. He grinned at Alec as his lower body sank slowly out of sight, and his hair flashed acid green. He cackled gleefully. "Make sure you land on the right spot!"

And then he was gone, the last strand of his ridiculous hair sinking into nothingness. "Ted?" Alec called. "Can you hear me?"

"Sure I can!" came a muffled voice from somewhere below him. Alec let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. "Get a move on, will you?"

Taking a deep breath and screwing his eyes shut – and then thinking better of it, remembering the patch – Alec jumped, and felt himself begin to sink. He forced himself not to struggle, even though his every instinct screamed at him to pull himself up and out. Then he landed with a thud onto soft dirt, and squinted as a glowing wand-tip pointed into his face.

"Hello!" said a voice. "Wasn't that cool?"

"It was!" Another voice. Ted's voice. Alec realized the first speaker had been James. As his eyes adjusted, he saw both of their faces – and both their bodies, this time, including James's – looming over himself. He scrambled to his feet.

"I don't know about cool," he muttered, "but definitely different. Excellent protection. I'll have to talk to Mom about getting some of this stuff planted back home."

"You can't," James said very solemnly. "Sorry. I wish I could let you, but it's kind of, er, vicious, and I don't think I'm supposed to let this particular species... copulate."

"Reproduce, idiot," Ted said witheringly. "Plants do not _copulate_."

"How would you know? You never paid any attention in Herbology," James shot back. Sol, who had been curled up in James's arms, wriggled free and shot away.

"Neither did you," Ted retorted. "How did you manage to work this plant thing, anyway?"

James waved an arm. "It wasn't me," he said. "Fern helped me with that."

"Fern?"

"Oh, a new kid. I keep forgetting you don't know the first-years. Fern Longbottom – she's only eleven, but she knows more Herbology than all the other Gryffindors put together. I think she said that plant is a result of Whomping Willow mixed with Devil's Snare and some other catapult thing."

"Well, it's awesome," Ted said decisively. "All it needs now is some Venus Flytrap DNA."

James grinned. "It is," he agreed. "She's a genius. Listen, we'd better start walking. The tunnel's not exactly short."

As they set off, Alec looked around. "Sol's gone off somewhere," he said. "Shouldn't we wait?"

"Nah." James shook his head. "He's a smart cat. I mean, he led you here. Obviously he knows his way. Impressive, isn't he, by the way?"

Alec felt compelled to nod, but couldn't help adding, "Church could probably have done that if we taught him how." He paused. "Then again, Church isn't exactly normal. He's our, ah, house cat," he added, seeing James's puzzled expression.

"Well, _I _think Sol is cool," said Ted. "I've only ever met trained owls. And dogs. Cats generally can't be bothered."

"That's true." James ducked to avoid a rock that was hanging from the ceiling. Or the ground, Alec realized, feeling weird. "So, Ted. Are you going to tell me what all this is about, or not?"

Ted glanced at Alec, his expression unreadable but relaxed. "Yeah," he said. Then, unexpectedly, he grinned. "This is way better than the stuff we'd make up to scare Albus back in third year, by the way," he said. "Just so you know."

They walked on as he began, walked and walked and walked, and the tunnel was seemingly as endless and as unchanging as Ted's flat voice as he told his story. When he was finished, they fell silent, the only noises made by their muffled footsteps. James eventually fell back with Ted, and Alec walked on ahead, sensing that he wanted to talk to Ted in private. He tried not to listen, but it was difficult in the tiny space; he hummed tunelessly to himself, and was relieved when Sol came back, providing a distraction. He had in his mouth not one but three mice, dangling by their tails and very much alive. He kept prodding James with his nose and meowing loudly.

"Yes, Sol, you're very clever," James said exasperatedly. "But not now, okay? I'm talking to Ted."

Ted laughed softly. He sounded somber, his earlier cheerfulness replaced by a quiet weariness. "It's fine," he said. "That's kind of all there is to it. Just don't tell anyone yet."

"I won't," James said. "Promise."

They walked the rest of the way in silence, punctuated by the squeaking of Sol's three captives. Eventually they came to a series of steps leading up to a trapdoor.

"Ah," James said, lifting it up and taking a breath. "Finally. Sunlight."

They climbed out one by one, emerging into a clump of thick bushes and closing the well-camouflaged trapdoor after them. This one was much less heavily guarded, concealed merely by a huge boulder that took the combined levitating charms of Ted and James to move back into place.

James summoned the Airhaven Aviation double-brooms, and they prepared to fly up, with Ted steering Alec and James riding a separate, sleek broom of his own. Alec could tell that James's broom was a Thoroughbred racehorse to his and Ted's Shetland pony – beautifully streamlined, with a gleaming finish and the words _Zippy Wind_ written across the front in gold lettering. Ted and James launched into conversation about something called Quidditch, and Alec leant down to pick up Sol, who was meowing loudly for attention. The mice in his jaw began to make an uproar.

James turned around. "Don't be disgusting, Sol, leave those poor rodents down here if you're coming up with us," he said. He took the mice by their tails and put them on the ground, where they scuttled away fast.

And then they kicked off the grass and soared into the air, Alec clinging to the broom and Sol clinging to Alec, leaving the three mice behind.


	16. Chapter 16

When Ted had first mentioned that Hogwarts was a wizarding school, the first mental image Alec's mind conjured had been of a building similar to the New York Institute. He had been close – only Hogwarts looked twice as old, twice as beautiful, and at least ten times as huge. This proved a good thing, because the huge castle had huge windows in it, and it was through one of these huge windows that the three boys and the cat let themselves into what Alec later learned was the Gryffindor Tower.

They received a hero's welcome. Nobody knew Alec, but the Gryffindors were apparently a very friendly lot and were not daunted at all by his being a stranger, or his being a Shadowhunter, or his being absolutely no fun to socialize with. They wanted to see his broken featherstaff, his bayonet, his stele, his seraph blade. He felt like an animal at a zoo.

Ted, too, was welcomed with flamboyant celebration. He had evidently been very popular in school. He told everyone he was just visiting for kicks, and promptly retreated into a corner with a girl who Alec had to admit was truly stunning.

When the two of them were done with their reunion – which, despite Ted's utterly sappy attitude about the girl earlier, didn't take a particularly long time – they beckoned Alec over. The girl, who was sitting on Ted's lap, gave him a wide smile. "Victoire Weasley," she said. "And you are Alec?"

"Yeah," Alec mumbled uncomfortably. "Hi."

She held out a bag of very colorful candy. "'Ave some sweets," she said. "My uncle owns a joke shop, and 'ee sends me far too much. You weel turn into a rubbair duck, but only for five seconds." She shook the bag. "Try it!"

Alec eyed the bag of sweets with growing apprehension. "Um," he said weakly, shuffling his feet, "thanks, but sweets aren't really my thing... or rubber ducks, actually. Maybe next time?"

Ted laughed. "He's not going to try it," he said. "Trust me."

Victoire shook her head. "You are no fun," she said, still smiling. "If you will not try ze candy, come and try ze Sorting 'At." She turned to Ted. "'Ee is not from 'Ogwarts, no? 'Ee talks funny."

"Of course he isn't from Hogwarts," Ted said, looking confused. "Hang on a minute... _No way_. You stole the Sorting Hat?"

She giggled. "'Eet was easy," she said gleefully, and got up. "'Eet ees in ze girls' dormitory. Wait 'ere." And she ran off, coming back moments later with a very old, very patchy hat in her hands. Ted gaped at it, and Alec wondered why this unimpressive hat was apparently such a trophy. "What does it... do?" he asked tentatively.

Ted grinned. "Find out for yourself," he said, and he dumped the hat onto Alec's head.

_Aha!_ said a voice, and Alec jumped a foot into the air. _What's this? Someone older, for a change... not a wizard, I see, but not a muggle either. Let me see... good, loyal... and clever, oh yes. Hmm. _There was a pause. Alec tried not to think about how weird it was having a hat talk to him about himself. He could tell that Ted couldn't hear the voice. Then, suddenly and out loud – "_Ravenclaw_!"

Ted grinned, took the hat off Alec's head, and eyed him in mock distaste. "You're officially inferior," he said matter-of-factly, and actually stuck out his tongue.

Victoire laughed, a pretty sound. Alec realized she reminded him of the faerie folk – there was something about her that was slightly surreal, dangerously beautiful. "Oh, come on, zey are a nice lot, Ravenclaws," she said. "No good at Quidditch, maybe, but zat ees seemply because zey just _read all day_." She snapped her fingers thrice, punctuating the last three words.

Alec was getting used to feeling thoroughly puzzled. "Do Ravenclaws have anything to do with were– with, ah, well, what are Ravenclaws, exactly?" he said, wincing. He'd forgotten that Victoire didn't know about Ted and his lycanthropy.

But neither Ted nor Victoire seemed to notice his stumble. They were looking at James, who had just ambled over and was giving Ted a meaningful look. "Hello, hello. Not up to any sneaky shenanigans yet?" he said, raising an eyebrow pointedly. "It's been ten minutes. Must be a record."

"You're right," said Ted quickly, untangling himself from Victoire. "I feel a strong urge to start planning something right now. Alec, entertain Vicky." And with that, he went with James to sit by the window, leaving Alec spluttering.

Victoire, on the other hand, was completely at ease. She took charge of Alec immediately, asking him various pointless questions about things like his favorite color (black) and his favorite weapon (bow and arrow), and telling him several times that his eyes were stunning. Alec attempted to pay attention to her whilst trying to eavesdrop on the two boys. He only caught snippets of jargon and, once, a particularly firm "NO, we are NOT using Polyjuice Potion again." After awhile he gave up, and tried to be friendlier to Victoire.

Presently Ted and James came back, and James said, "Sorry, Alec, but we're going to have to have this adventure on our own. Ted can disguise himself, but you'll stick out too much with your tattoos, and if you continue being half-invisible it'll be too risky. We might have to hide, too, and you don't know your way around."

Alec's heart sank. He fought the urge to protest, remembering how frustrating it was when Isabelle didn't listen to him even when she knew full well that he was right. "So... what do I do now?" he said instead. "Wait here?"

"I guess," said James apologetically. "Vicky can teach you spells or something."

Victoire's wand was far more feisty than Ted's, but by the time the two boys had returned, Alec could move a book from one table to another and turn chopsticks into arrows. Victoire was well pleased. "You see," she said, "eet ees not so bad being a Ravenclaw, after all."

Ted returned with a sober expression on his face, and James didn't look any less glum. The latter went through one of the doorways – the boys' dormitory – and didn't come out. ("He's sulking," Ted said. "He always does that when a plan fails.")

They had to wait until Victoire went away to the girls' dormitory before Ted could tell Alec about the news – or the lack thereof. By then, it was late, and the common room was deserted. "We learned _nothing_," he muttered. "Absolutely nothing. Honestly, I thought the ghosts of Hogwarts would be a little less disappointing. And the portraits! I swear, all of them are supremely stupid."

Alec was baffled. "Why are you asking the ghosts and the portraits?" he asked, realizing belatedly that apparently portraits could talk here.

"Because," Ted said patiently, "they would have been here for the longest time. For instance, Nearly Headless Nick has been around since before my dad was in school, and the Grey Lady is even more ancient."

"So they would have known your father..." Alec said slowly, piecing Ted's words together.

"Yes, they would. And my father didn't know how to cure lycanthropy either. But he did have a potion... made by Severus Snape, a former headmaster... and I was thinking maybe we could find out what it was, and maybe from that we could learn a little more about werewolves, and improvise, and figure out..." He trailed off slowly.

"Well, that's a few hours wasted," Alec said with a sigh. "If only we could just turn back time. Make things so much easier."

Ted froze.

"Uh-oh," Alec said.

"Merlin's beard, that's _it_!" Ted shot up from his chair, staring at Alec. "You've proven useful after all, you clever little Ravenclaw lost puppy! Turn back time! That's _it_!"

He grabbed Alec's arm and began to sprint back toward where he had entered from earlier. Then he skidded to a halt and put the full Disillusionment Charm on Alec again. "Follow me and _keep quiet_," he hissed, and shoved the huge door open. "If we get caught or anything, find your way back here, understand? The password is _bafflement._"

"There's no need to give the password on your way _out_, dear," said a sleepy voice, and Alec, bewildered, realized the voice was the door, and the door was a portrait, and – "What? Ouch! _Bafflement_? Ted! Ted, where are we going?"

"To the seventh floor corridor," Ted whispered, dragging Alec along behind him. "No time to explain. Just follow me!"


	17. Chapter 17

"I still don't see," Magnus said, as he and Harry walked across the castle grounds, "why we should come looking here. If we don't know for sure if Alec and Ted are here or not."

Harry glanced at his watch. "I told you, James is Ted's best friend," he said, without looking at Magnus. He squinted into the darkness. "If Ted has told anyone what he's up to, it would be him."

"Fine, fine." Magnus frowned, irritated. "Where are we going now, then? Up to the school?"

"Yes. The older kids will mostly be in bed by now." Harry slowed down, peering into the forest at the edge of which they were walking. Magnus saw a flash of rosetted golden coat and a pair of amber eyes, and then a leopard stepped out, looking at them curiously – or what Magnus guessed was curiously. He raised his eyebrows.

"Hello, George," said Harry mildly. "Have you seen James anywhere today?"

The leopard dipped his head. "Passed by earlier with another boy," he said, in a London accent. Magnus's jaw dropped. "Brought a cat, too."

"What did the boy look like?" Harry asked, evidently unsurprised by the leopard's – George's – ability to speak English. George blinked. "Black hair, strange skin. I couldn't see very much of him, but he wasn't from Hogwarts, I think."

"Cheers," Harry said, and George disappeared into the trees with a light flick of his tail. Harry turned to Magnus and laughed at his undisguised amazement. "What did I tell you?" he said, continuing towards the castle. "Alec was here. At least, he was probably here."

"Good." Magnus followed him for a few steps, and then felt something tugging at his shoelace. He looked down.

"Ew," he said. "Mice. Three of them, in fact." He tried to shake the mouse off his foot. "So, can these talk, too?"

The mouse squeaked loudly. Harry stopped, and looked more closely at it, and then at its companions. "Hold still," he told Magnus, and Magnus stopped kicking. Harry frowned.

"Mice don't usually do that," he said slowly. "Cling onto feet, I mean. And anyway, what are mice doing this close to the Forest?"

"How am I supposed to know? What are mice doing this close to my _feet_?"

Harry didn't answer. Instead, he picked one of the mice up by their tail. Its feet flailed in the air, and it let out very loud squeaks. Harry pointed his wand-tip at its belly and, hesitating for a few seconds, muttered something under his breath.

_Pop_. Harry dropped the mouse – except it wasn't a mouse any more. It had long black hair, and lacked a tail, and wore a furious expression.

It was a girl.

The girl began to shriek.

The girl said – "_Turn Jace and Clary back! Now!_"

Magnus blinked. He looked at the remaining two mice (who were running around in circles), and then at Harry, and then back at the girl.

"_Oh_, for the _love_ of _all_ things _holy_," he muttered, throwing his hands up. Blue sparks flew into the air, briefly lighting the night sky.

Harry looked half surprised, and half amused, with a tinge of exasperation. He flicked his wand twice more, in quick succession, and within five seconds there stood Jace, and Clary, and Isabelle, all looking thoroughly discombobulated.

Harry looked at Magnus. "Apparently, yes, they _can_ talk."

Magnus was not amused. He eyed the three Shadowhunters with distaste. "What are you three doing here?" he said. "Actually, don't answer that. How did you three _follow me here_?"

Isabelle was the one who answered. "We didn't," she said.

"Nonsense."

"No, it's true." Clary looked a little green. "We, ah, got carried here. By a cat. By the way, Magnus, the situation back in Brooklyn is one hell of a mess."

"I couldn't care less about Brooklyn at the moment," said Magnus. "Or the cat, for that matter. Screw the cat. Where is Alec? I want to hurry up and get him and go home already."

"Alec," said Jace, who was fastidiously checking himself over for remaining fur and whiskers, "is fine. In fact, he's running around the grounds with his new boyfriend, flying on broomsticks and getting teleported. That's normal here, isn't it? Teleportation?" He scowled.

Harry coughed. "It isn't," he said assuredly. "You can't teleport out of Hogwarts. Well, you can't Disapparate out of Hogwarts, which I assume is what you meant."

"But he did," said Clary. "He put on this necklace thing, with the other guy, and they started turning it around and they just... disappeared. I mean, we tried to stop them, but I don't think they even noticed us." She frowned. "It's no fun being a mouse. I'll have to say sorry to Simon for all the rat jokes."

But Harry didn't appear to be listening. He held up a hand. "What did you say they put on? A necklace?"

"Yeah." Isabelle nodded. "It wasn't even a _nice_ necklace. I mean, I was short-sighted at the time, but it kind of looked like an hourglass. What kind of weirdo wears an hourglass necklace? Even to teleport? I mean, can't they design–"

"QUIET," said Harry, losing his patience. Magnus noticed a new expression on his face – a hint of fear. "And you say they turned it?" Isabelle nodded. "How many times?"

"Are you planning on telling me what this is all about?" Magnus asked, somehow managing to look baffled and icy all at once.

"No. There's no time. Literally no _time_." Harry turned to Magnus. "What did you say Alec was chasing again, when you last saw him?"

"A werewolf. Or we think it was a werewolf."

Harry cursed slowly under his breath. "This can't possibly... How many times did he turn the hourglass? Once? Twice?"

Isabelle looked uncertainly at Jace, who shrugged. "Don't know," he said. "Much more than once or twice, though. I mean, they were turning and turning and turning. It took ages. Why? Is this a bad thing? I thought Alec was having fun."

"Alec does not have fun," Isabelle said. "I might believe it if you told me he was chasing freak werewolves and flying on broomsticks and getting involved in wizardry, but having _fun_? That's just stretching it a little too far."

Harry ignored them. He seemed to be struggling to make a decision. Finally he turned to the four Shadow Worlders. "Come with me," he said grimly, starting off again. "Hurry."

"So, _is_ this bad?" said Jace, raising an eyebrow.

There was a pause.

"Yes." Harry inhaled slowly. "Unless I'm much mistaken, this is very, very bad."


	18. Chapter 18

"_Funny," said Ted, looking around. "You'd think the Forest would have looked a little different so many years ago. But it looks exactly the same as before to me. What do you think, Alec?" _

Alec squirmed carefully out of the necklace that was chained around both their necks. He regarded it with a sort of queasy apprehension. "I think," he said, taking in the penumbral shadows around them, "that traveling through time is much, much creepier than traveling through space, whether it's in a fireplace or with you."

"Don't be such a killjoy," Ted scoffed. "Come on, you have to admit this is fascinating. It's the first interesting History lesson I've ever had, and I've _graduated_."

"I don't know about that. How many years have we traveled, again?"

"Twenty-something, I think." Ted screwed up his eyes, squinting at the hourglass on the necklace. "Give or take a few years, I guess. I didn't really know how to use this time-turner thing."

This surprised Alec. "Don't you learn in class?"

"Ha! Class? No." Ted looked equally bemused. "What gave you _that _idea?"

"Well, there were so many of them in that room. I thought it was a classroom or something. I mean, if you learn to do things like Disapparation, I thought it stood to reason you'd have classes in time-travel as well."

Ted laughed, shaking his head. "We don't. Only the smartest witches and wizards are supposed to meddle with time-travel. That room near the tapestry... well, it's complicated, but basically it gives you stuff you really want. If I'd gone in there asking for an extra wand for you, it probably would have given me one."

"Bummer. I could have used one of those." Alec smiled wryly. "Is it just me, or is night-time twenty-something years ago a little brighter than night-time is nowadays? For instance, tonight is as bright as a night of..."

He trailed off abruptly, the color suddenly draining from his face. Almost against his will, he looked up – and there, hanging in the deep blue sky and as milky white as a pearl, was –

"The full moon," Ted whispered. The smile disappeared from his face. "As bright as a night of the full moon... Alec," he said suddenly. "Alec, I think I got it wrong. Maybe we didn't go back around twenty years. Maybe we went forward just over twenty_ days_..."

"Ted Lupin," said Alec, "I could kill you."

And then a searing pain shot down his spine; he heard Ted curse; felt his skin melting, his bones breaking. He heard a howl in the distance, a howl that sounded eerily human – and then a howl much nearer – and then a cry, a human cry – his name? His name! – he spun around –

x

– "_Alec!_" Isabelle shrieked, running.

Harry caught her and held her back. "He won't know you," he said urgently. "He'll kill you. Or turn you into a werewolf."

"Of course he'll know me!" said Isabelle furiously. "He's my brother!"

"Your brother who has just turned into a werewolf. He's not –"

Isabelle launched a savage backwards kick at Harry. He yelped, and let her go. "Ouch!"

She and Jace ran toward the hideous thing that was Alec, with Clary and Magnus following close behind. Halfway there, Jace skidded to a halt. He stared at a point somewhere behind the two werewolves.

"Crap," he said. "Why are there _four_ of them?"

"Because," said Harry, who was shooting jets of light in every direction, "those two are Ted and Alec now, except they've traveled to the future, and _those_ two" – indicating the two emerging shapes – "are the Ted and Alec_ from _the future."

"I have no idea what the hell you're talking about," Jace said decisively. "But man, they're _hideous_." He started forward again. "Hold the other three off!" he called over his shoulder.

Hexes, jinxes, and other things Jace hadn't thought existed were being blasted everywhere, and Magnus was using bizarre magic of his own to hold off the other Alec and the two Teds.

Jace's fingers curled around a short knife in his belt. He prayed that he wouldn't have to use it, but as he looked at the werewolf five feet away, his grip on the handle tightened.

"Alec," he said tentatively, and then realized he had no idea what to do.

_Remind him of who he is. Return him to consciousness. _

"Alec," Jace said again. "Um. Hi. It's me."

"Ugh," said Isabelle, and whacked Jace across the shoulder, shoving him aside. She yanked Clary forward. "Alec, it's us," she said, a little desperately. "Izzy, and –"

The werewolf howled. Isabelle gave a small scream and backed away, pulling Clary with her. "It's not working," she cried, and the werewolf came forward, raising a set of gnarled claws...

x

Clary couldn't think straight. She glanced desperately at Magnus – Magnus, who always seemed to know what to do –

– and then it came to her, as quickly and as clearly as though an image had been dropped into her head by magic. She was in Magnus Bane's flat, for the very first time, and he was showing her a rune from the Gray Book. She remembered its heavy, translucent pages on her lap, remembered the inky black rune...

Jace's voice: _Magnus showed you the rune for understanding and remembrance._

She didn't stop to think. Whipping out her stele, she began to trace the rune on the air. She wondered if it would work if it wasn't actually applied onto Alec's skin, but it had worked on her, hadn't it?

With a few last frantic strokes, the rune was finished. She held her breath, watching –

x

Alec remembered.

x

He howled once. The pain was ebbing away, slowly but surely. His thoughts were returning to human ones. When he glanced at himself, he saw his bones reforming, saw his elongated limbs return to human arms and legs; and, underneath the light of the full moon, he stood. Human again.

Around him – chaos.

x

Then there was a pair of familiar arms around him.

"Alec," said Magnus roughly, and kissed him, none too gently. Alec felt the warlock's fingernails digging into his skin. Magnus held him there for a moment, quietly.

The world swum out of focus.

x

"Go send this up to the hospital wing for me, will you, Soren?"

"Owls carrying mail. Really, all the stories are true, after all."

"They are, Magnus, aren't they? But some stories are kept secret for a reason."

"Oh, I know. Nobody knows that better than I do, actually. But my Alec keeps secrets well, trust me. I suffered a long time for that very reason... anyway, it doesn't matter. I can take care of the others. Modifying memories is one of my specialties."

"Sadly, wizarding law requires that you allow me to do that for Alec."

"Yes, Harry, you've told me that a few times already. I trust you remember the deal we made."

"Certainly. It's been a pleasure knowing you, Magnus. I have faith in the promise you made, and you can rest assured I'll keep my side of the bargain. Knowledge and memory are precious things... I'm glad we don't have to sacrifice them."

"Are those his memories?"

"Yes."

"You've extracted Ted's already?"

"Not yet. I will, when he's recovered a bit more... here you go."

"And the..."

"The Pensieve? Here."

"Thank you... isn't it pretty."

x

"That party was _wild_," said Isabelle, groaning. "Can you even remember any of it?" she asked of nobody in particular.

"I never forget the best bits, no matter how drunk I am," said Magnus gloatingly. "I'm not even hungover today."

"We all know what you spent the night doing, Magnus, and it wasn't drinking," Jace said, ignoring Alec's murderous scowl. "I, for one, don't remember anything except various make-outs and punch-outs."

Magnus was chuckling. "Do _you_ remember anything, Alec?"

Alec shook his head. He was frowning at a slip of paper, folding it and unfolding it. "I don't remember anything," he said confusedly. "I think someone gave this to me, but I don't..."

"What's that?" Jace leaned over curiously.

"Haven't the foggiest. Found it in my pocket."

"Maybe you were drunk," Isabelle suggested. "Nothing's possible. I mean everything's impossible – hang on..."

Jace shot her a disgusted glance and began to read from Alec's note.

"Alec," he said. "You will have forgotten me by the time you read this. I will have forgotten you, too. I'm sorry, but it's better this way. My world and yours don't mix. At least I got permission to write you a note first, though it won't help in any practical way, I guess. I never found a cure, but thanks for trying. I won't make much sense to you, but I am as much my father as my mother now, and there is some comfort to be gained from that. Yours, Ted."

Alec looked thoroughly baffled. "I'm pretty sure I wasn't drunk," he said uncomfortably. "I _never_ get drunk. And besides, I was, er, busy."

Magnus snickered.

"What's funny?" Alec asked, looking at the little vial which Magnus was carefully examining. It contained a sort of silvery liquid, or gas, that moved in swirls. "Where did you get _that_ from?"

Magnus smiled. He pocketed the vial and leaned back in his chair, eyes glinting mischievously.

"One day," he said, "I will tell you all about it."

**FIN.**

The Mortal Instruments series was written by Cassandra Clare, and the Harry Potter series was written by Joanne Kathleen Rowling.

**CAMEO APPEARANCES**

Serafina the vampire, in Chapter One, is Serafina Pekkala from His Dark Materials [Philip Pullman], with her daemon goose Kaisa.

Alice the vampire, in Chapter Two, is Alice Cullen from Twilight [Stephenie Meyer].

In Chapter Three, the Farid & Dustfinger mentioned on the bottled fire are the Farid & Dustfinger from Inkheart [Cornelia Funke].

In Chapter Four and later chapters, Hester Shaw the witch aviator is Hester Shaw from Mortal Engines [Philip Reeve].

In Chapter Five and later chapters, Sol the cat is Sol from Warrior Cats: Power of Three [Erin Hunter].

In Chapter Six, George the leopard is George from Lionboy [Zizou Corder].

In Chapter Seven, Soren the owl is Soren from Guardians of Ga'Hoole [Kathryn Lasky].

**Thanks a lot to everyone who has stayed with me till this last chapter. It means more than you know! :) Hope you've enjoyed the story. **

**Team Alec! ;P**


End file.
